Project 013
by SpoonyChan
Summary: A group of people participated in getting injected by an unnamed hallucinogen for a couple of bucks. Axel, Roxas, Zexion, and Demyx had no idea then that they'd be running from the government agency, "The Org", 6 years later.
1. Rejoin

A/N - To those of you who got an update on at a chapter update, that's because I've been proofreading deeper and fixing some kinks and small inconsistencies in the story. There's not much a difference, but my goal is to make this story run as smoothly and logically as possible once I'm done cleaning it up. So when you get updates on this, don't freak out, okay?

"Xigbar Crutch, if I'm not mistaken?"

The character looked up as he was addressed by his entire name, something that didn't often happen with the kind of respect people gave him, and he didn't blame them – who would give respect to a beat up carcass like him? His right eye was adorned with a leather eye patch, his left cheek sliced through nastily by a scar he obtained from a past experience he only enjoyed sharing when under the influence, and his greasy black hair fell heavily behind his head in a long ponytail streaked with a line of white. What unnerved most people about him was his piercing, eagle-like yellow eye.

And to wrap it all up and totally turn off all efforts to respect him, he was a total jackass.

"Yup. That would be me," he directed gruffly with a snide smirk at the man in front of him, Vexen Webb.

Vexen didn't have respect for _anyone _except himself. The sight of Xigbar Crutch standing a foot away from him, giving off the stench of gunpowder and cigarette smoke, chewing on the end of a toothpick and curling his hands in his lifeless jacket caused the scientist to obviously lift a thin, blonde eyebrow and bulge his emerald green eyes until they nearly fell out of his head.

"Got somethin' to say to me, old man, or you gonna have me standing here all day?"

Vexen snorted in disgust, clamping his clipboard to his chest huffily and spinning around, his equally greasy, long hair moving heavily through his movements.

"This way."

Xigbar followed the taller man in the lab coat, although he admitted silently to himself that he felt far taller and more important than him despite his higher rank and longevity.

The hall they traveled down was narrow and the ceiling was probably twelve feet above their heads, and they were both sizeable heights. It made Xigbar, a person especially unnerved by limited space, incredibly on edge. What added to the ethereal effect was the total washed out whiteness of it all. Vexen seemed to blend in like a yellow-ended chameleon in his garments of nothing but white, gloves and all.

"Xemnas told me to show you around," Vexen explained to the nervous Xigbar, "and by 'around' he meant the only one we have managed to keep to ourselves."

Xigbar huffed arrogantly as they turned a corner and stopped in front of a large pane of glass, revealing a spacious clean room that was seemingly empty until the piercing eagle eye caught sight of her creamy milk hair, hanging from her drooped head in curtains.

She was…well, _beautiful_. Xigbar almost felt as if he was in love with the little girl, but heh, he was no pedophile. Well, not _that _much. The girl looked around six years of age, her body petite and fragile and completely vulnerable under that thin, beige dress of hers that ended dangerously right past the end of her bottom. She sat in a small, plastic periwinkle chair – crafted from PlaySkool, no doubt – staring at her sandaled toes. She was nearly motionless.

"This is Naminé Rose." Vexen uttered, looking upon the young girl with awe-inspiring hope, "She's the daughter of two of our members who were participants in Project 013."

"Huh." Xigbar grunted, transfixed by the girl's mysterious aura, "So what's she in for, huh? What's her issue?"

"She's an amazing artist, Mr. Crutch," Vexen began, referring to his notes etched onto his clipboard, "You give her a box of Crayola crayons and she has that room filled with eye-opening murals from floor to ceiling within days – incredible works of art that would have Michelangelo fuming with envy. They portray people more emotionally than I have ever seen with a mere eight-pack of crayons."

Xigbar huffed haughtily through his nose. "_So_? The kid's got talent. What's the deal with locking a cutie like her up like this?"

"Naminé Rose has been blind since birth, Mr. Crutch."

The fact hit Xigbar hard, but he hardly wavered. "Heh, so she's got a bit of clairvoyance. Big deal. What's the danger?"

Vexen chuckled through his nose sadistically, "When she asked us for a box of crayons, Mr. Crutch, one of our cohorts happily obliged. Within hours she had pictures of the most miserable looking sequence of events colored over her walls. When said cohort went back to monitor her progress, he displayed the scenes in horror and within minutes, he snuck his way into my lab and shoved as many as my chemicals as he could down his throat."

Xigbar paused, processing the information quickly.

"So anything she draws…happens?"

"No no no…" Vexen corrected, waving a finger in time with his _no_s, "Anything she draws _has_ happened…in the mind of whoever stumbles upon her drawings, that is. She draws things horrid enough to drive any weak-minded person into suicide. What she does is create fake memories."

"Well, old man…" Xigbar began, "If you know what her drawings look like and that they do this, how come you're still standing and still have all real memories as far as I know?"

Vexen smirked, that same chuckle escaping him as his body shook with small mirth. "We found a loophole. We have cameras that watch her, but the monitors we have are outdated and only show in black and white. Apparently the drawings effects only work if you see them in color."

He flipped through a few sheets of paper on his clipboard, producing a small collection of colorless photographs. Xigbar relieved him of them, sifting through them rather quickly. The images he viewed were quite grotesque even without color. There were several personas that obviously represented parental figures confronting small children violently, and several images where the parents were denoted by hearts of loving nurture, then later had a dull blackness spilling out of their necks or their bodies struggling lamely against gravity as their necks hung from nooses. This "dull blackness", Xigbar decided, was blood – gallons of it.

"You understand what I mean?" Vexen asked, clipping the photos back into his clipboard.

"Yeah…" Xigbar aired.

"Regardless, she's quite obedient," Vexen continued, resuming his study of the seemingly lifeless girl, "Submissive is more the word, but it's far better than a dangerous thing like her objecting to everything we offer her."

Xigbar rubbed the newly growing stubble on his chin, musing. "Sooo…what's the point of showing her to me, old man? You've already got her all caged up – there's no point in me catching her. The boss said something about catching a _band _of these freaks."

"Ah, well…" Vexen _almost_ hesitated, "I'm just showing you what your up against. Imagine a person of this power, like little Naminé here, but three times her age, disobedient, on the run, and of course, able to see?"

Xigbar quirked an eyebrow, surveying the scientist, "Are you serious? How many?"

"Six."

"_Six_?"

"Well, four. We're not counting two – they've diluted their powers greatly by the influence of alcohol and unnatural aging."

"I see…" Xigbar growled, rubbing his chin again, considering his job, "So…you want me to catch them and…kill them?"

"It's preferred you keep them alive. We need to experiment on them to know the extent of their power, and how we can use it…"

"Huh…" He scratched the top of his head like a rather skinny gorilla as the scientist looked at him with hope, "Well…can't you tell me what they _look_ like? Or what they _do_? Where did you see them last?"

Vexen held up a finger, about to speak, but said finger dropped. "This way," he spoke once again, "Xemnas has the files in his office."

_001_002_003_004_005_006_007_008_009_010_011_012_013_

"Look, kid…we'll be okay."

The small blonde felt his side of the bed rise under him as the crimson-head, nearly twice his height, took his seat next to him…perhaps a little too close. He started pulling at the end of his over-sized long sleeves, averting all eye contact with the acidic eyes over those strange diamonds, triangles, upside-down teardrops…whatever the hell they were. He just didn't want to look at them.

"C'mon, Rox…why aren't you talking to me?"

His voice was sultry, laced with the occasional cigarette -- "occasional" meaning it'd been a good six years since the last time he'd been able to _afford_ a cigarette. Roxas half-growled, half-purred in response, turning his head away and crossing his arms.

"You never take situations like this seriously, Axel…" he mumbled, "Even when we're on the run from some freak government agency, you don't take the situation seriously…"

"Of _course _I do!" Axel chirped, sneaking an arm around the small teen's shoulders, "I'm just more realistic than you, Sunshine. We're okay – really. You think they'd check a run-down, ram-shackled motel like this for two runaway science experiments? Pff…"

"Yes, actually," Roxas turned his head toward those beautiful, malachite eyes for the first time in a while, "It makes perfect sense. We have no money so where the hell are we gonna stay? Some Quality Inn? Tch, of course not. If you ask me, this'll be the first place they check."

"Awwwh, there's nothing to worry about, babe," the older man laughed, stretching out like a cat on the blonde's lap, hanging his long legs over the end of the bed, "If anyone comes after you, I'll burn their ass and you know it."

"Wonderful tactic," Roxas grumbled sardonically, ignoring the child-like eyes staring up at him, "Then everyone in the whole _country _will know about us and they'll have sleeping darts on us faster than we can say –"

"Neh, they wouldn't affect you with your power…y'think?"

Roxas blinked, stuttering a bit. "They could! All I can do is heal people. Wooooo big deal."

"Yeah," Axel laughed, bringing up a slender finger to poke the tip of the blonde's nose, "but we make one kick ass team, huh?"

"Yeah, yeah…" Roxas murmured, batting the finger away.

They both jumped, Axel sitting bolt upright as something pounded on the door murderously at the same time as a strike of thunder. Roxas scampered into the bathroom instantly, his heart rate up in a trice as he ducked inside the bathtub, pulling the mucky shower curtain around him with shivering hands. Axel watched him all the while as the blonde hid, cringing at a second barrage of fists on the door.

"Open up!" came a rather nasally, distressed voice, "_Open up_! _Please_! We're the same as you!"

Axel raised a brow suspiciously, mouthing "the same as you" questioningly as he inched toward the door, drawing his head back from the peephole quickly as they pounded on it again. A shivering dirty blonde was apparent through the grubby glass, crying out "_Let us in_!" Through the rain and thunder.

Axel put his hand to the knob and turned, pulling open the door. He started when sopping wet arms groped around his neck, soaked locks brushing him under his chin.

"Axyyyy…" the young voice groaned against Axel's chest, "It's been six years and I finally found you…n'oooh…"

"Do you have a tub in here?"

Axel looked up from the boy's sopping wet hair, directing his eyes downward to a much smaller, slate-haired boy. He was only a bit taller than Roxas, his hair plastered over his face as he crossed his arms and shivered.

"Yeah…" Axel told him, blinking unbelievably at the two's sudden appearance. It was all too sudden, "Just tell Roxas to get out of it – he's hiding."

The taller visitor gasped and backed up from Axel. "Roxy's here too? Omigosh, the last time I saw him he was so little!"

"Heh," Axel chuckled as the hyperactive blonde squelched his way to the bathroom, following his smaller counterpart, "He's still pretty little, Dem…"

Roxas heard the commotion and emerged from the bathtub, pulling back the curtains and looking around warily. Demyx caught sight of him and pulled him into a spinning, wet hug, crying, "Roxyyyy! Oh my _gosh,_ you've grown so much!"

"Haah! Get off, you're getting me wet!"

The older blonde frowned and discontinued twirling, setting down the smallest carefully with a weak, "'Kay."

"So are you gonna dry us off, Dem, or are we just doing this the hard way?" asked the misty-voiced teen, combing his fingers through his hair and pushing it out of his right eye.

"I can do it," the blonde said with a beam, "It's not like I'm parting the Red Sea or anything…Axy, Roxy, get in here!"

Roxas didn't feel comfortable with a near to complete stranger calling him "Roxy" – he only let Axel call him that ridiculous nickname. And "_Axy_"? It didn't suit him. Nevertheless, the two of them stepped their way into the cramped bathroom and watched as Demyx put his fore- and middle finger to his temple, staring unblinkingly into space as he uttered, "Hold still."

His teal eyes were covered in a milky layer of white as all four of them felt the sensation of small beads of rainwater pulling at their clothes, escaping and floating up and over the shower curtain, causing a thousand resonating _plinks _to echo through the bathroom as the water drops hit the bottom of the tub. Demyx's hair slowly began to fluff and stand up as the water slid off his tufts of hair and made it into the tub in trickles. Axel was baffled at this strange sensation, watching his old friend in such deep concentration. Demyx and concentration? Did not compute. Water particles leaving everyone's body?

That was just fucking _cool_.

Demyx sighed, removing his fingers from his temple once everyone was sufficiently dry. His eyes were in a haze for half a second before he shook the cloudiness from them and put a rough hand to his other's small back and announced, "You know Zexion, right Axel?"

Axel shrugged, laughing at how the blonde just threw the past occurrence off like it was nothing. "'Course I know him. We lived together, neh?"

"Oooh yeah," Demyx mused, rubbing his chin, "Well, it's been a while and my memories from that far back are kind of hazy, so...say hiiii, Zexy!"

Zexion pouted, rolling his eyes and saying plainly, "Hi."

"So you two…" Roxas began, cocking his head in thought, "You were in Project 013 too?"

Demyx quickly smiled, nodding his head in rapid succession as Zexion put a fist to his lips before looking directly at Roxas and simply bobbing his head.

A/N - Well hi there everyone. This has been an idea floating in my head for a while, mostly inspired by the book by Stephen King – Firestarter. If you haven't read it, do. It's the best book I've ever read.

Basically, this is a sci-fi approach to Kingdom Hearts. It's AU of course, but I've tied everyone's powers and things into the mix as best as I could. Reminds me of X-Men a bit. Don't worry, fangirls, there IS going to be some smut and yaoi things, but that's not really the whole point of the story. I thought I should take a break from writing fluff and sex and homosexuality as the central theme so here you are.

Hope you like so far…I thought it was a neat idea to write about.


	2. Restart

Roxas watched the two reverse characters sitting at the bed opposite of him as Axel ceremoniously took his shower in the bathroom. Any normal person would quickly avoid eye contact, especially with eyes like Roxas's, but Demyx stared into the catlike, cobalt eyes. He _had_ been staring at him for about a minute, hunching his back as if it were a game, waiting for the feisty blonde to react. He eventually did, breaking the contact by rolling his eyes and looking away.

"You're different, Roxy," Demyx stated, slightly broken, "You were so cute when you were little. Your eyes were even bigger and you were so tiny and happy and cute. Neh, you still are, but you're so mean now."

Roxas huffed, flopping backward on the bed.

"D'you even remember us, Roxy?"

The blonde closed his eyes, straining his memory. He was only eight, but any normal child remembered back that long ago. Six years…it wasn't much. He hardly remembered last week better yet six years before. He shook his head, saying, "Barely."

"N'oooh, how come?" Demyx relayed with a pout unfit for his age, "All four of us were in the same hospital room and there was no curtain in between us. You and Axy shared a bed…so did Zexy and I but…we lived in the same apartment for a little bit, too, and--!"

"He probably doesn't remember because of the experiment, Dem…" the cool voice of Zexion replied. The mysterious teenager moved naught but his lips as he said this.

"Yeah but we all got the same stuff – how come I remember and he doesn't?"

The slate-haired boy sighed, shaking his head. "We all had different reactions. Plus, he was younger. It must've affected his memory a lot more than us."

"I guess that makes sense…" Dem agreed musingly, a finger to his lips as Roxas rolled up, sitting up once again.

"So what're your powers, um...again?" the younger boy asked curiously.

Demyx looked to the boy, withdrawing the finger and smiling warmly before saying, "Well of course mine is water…or something like that. I can control anything with H2O in it, meaning not just water, but ice and water vapor too. It's like…like…"

"Telekinesis," Zexion added, his hair covering his face as he continued to remain still in his laying down position.

"Yeah! But with water."

Roxas nodded, taking in the information before looking to Zexion for an answer. After a moment, the drowsy boy flipped the hair out of his ice-blue eyes to look at Roxas before sitting up and stretching.

"Well…" he put his hand into his pocket, pulling something dirty and green out. He stretched it out, displaying it to Roxas. It was a five hundred dollar bill!

"Take it," Zexion offered, stretching across the area between the beds with the slightest hint of a smile across the visible half of his face. Roxas reached for it, grasping for it…but nothing was there. He blinked, seeing Zexion's hand, holding absolutely nothing. He brought two fists up to his eyes, rubbing them vigorously. Zexion laughed.

"I've always wanted to do that," he stated, "but my power's illusion. I can make people see, smell, hear, taste, or feel things that aren't really there…but just like Demyx, I can't use it too much or I get a splitting headache. A lot more than him, though."

"I'm the same way," Roxas replied, shaking his head. His eyes were watering from how hard he wiped his eyes, "Well, I'm sure you two already know, but I don't really get headaches – I just temporarily feel pain, but it depends on how big the wound is…or whatever it is…"

"Yeah, your power's healing..." Zexion nodded, remembering faintly. Demyx positioned himself closer to the edge of the bed, his knees nearly touching with Roxas's. The boy nodded.

"So what's Axel's again?" Demyx asked in a hushed whisper.

"I _thought_ I heard someone talking about me."

The redhead emerged from the bathroom, shirtless and towel-drying his long spikes. He grinned at Roxas before he threw his towel in the bathroom sloppily, answering Demyx with, "Pyrokinesis."

Demyx narrowed an eye, watching Axel drag the towel through his long tresses. "Pyro…_whatsisis_?"

"Pyrokinesis, Dem," Zexion informed curtly, "He can make objects spontaneously combust with his mind?"

"Ooooooh yeah!" The dirty blonde sat erect. "He control fire like I can control water, right?"

"Not really," Axel shook his mane, heading back into the bathroom to receive his shirt, "I can just start fires, make temperatures higher, all that good stuff. It's hard to control if I get mad or upset, sooo…it kinda sucks sometimes."

"But do you get headaches?"

Axel appeared once again from the bathroom, pulling his gray shirt over his head, "Nope. Just not the easiest thing to control. I'm just special that way."

"It certainly fits your flamboyant personality." Zexion remarked, regarding the pyro with a wry hint of a smile. Said pyro bowed extravagantly, his nose and fingertips nearly sweeping the floor.

Roxas quietly laughed, hiding it with a brisk cough.

__01__02__03__04__05__06__07__08__09__010__011__012__013__

Five or so miles away, a plain, forest green Cadillac traveled unceremoniously down the highway. Its paint was worn and its tires were definitely in need of air. A woman with sharp features sat behind the wheel, seemingly livid with her back hunched and her unusual antennae made of her platinum-blonde hair streaked back. She was trying to hurry without causing an accident or attracting attention as she spun the steering wheel several times to turn right irritably.

"They just _had_ to give me this piece of _shit _car, didn't they? _Didn't they_?" she griped pointlessly, throwing her shocking green-blue eyes to the man sitting next to her.

This man wouldn't have been taken as a man at first glance, just as this certain woman wouldn't have been known as a woman at first glance. For one, this man was busy casually examining his cuticles with his leg crossed over the other importantly. For another, his hair was an exotic, pale pink.

"Don't you look at _me_," he pouted. Despite his feminine mannerisms, his voice was deep and manly, but the way he always laced it with his sing-songy tone and set it to a rhythm that was slow and practically seductive just screamed THERE IS A LOT OF FRUIT IN THIS MAN'S BASKET. "It was Mansex's idea to give us such a piece of shit as a ride."

Mansex. That's what everyone called the leader of The Org behind his back. At first, it was a funny joke, but then it became standard to call him either "Mansex" or "Sexman". Of course, _Xemnas_ was completely outside to this inside joke. If he knew, he'd rip _everyone's _eyes out.

"Aaannndd _why_ did he give us this piece of shit as a ride?" Larxene asked, careful to keep her eyes on the road.

"He doesn't want you to recklessly use your power and this is the only car he had in stock that wasn't electrical."

"Oh, like I would 'recklessly use my power'!" she imitated his slow drawl of a voice, connecting her eyes with the radio, "What's he gonna do about this, hm?"

She pressed a red-clawed index finger to the radio. Without pressing a button, a surge of energy shot through her and she _pushed_ slightly back and forth with her mind, causing the tuner to slide back and forth rapidly, switching between channels.

"I don't think he'd care if you could tune into a radio station with your mind, Larxene," the man sneered, "He just didn't want you to make the car go super fast or…or _fly _or –"

"Jesus Christ, I can't make cars _fly_, idiot!" Larxene spat as she removed her finger from the device, "I control _electricity_. Nothing in this car gives it the ability to fly. Tch, it'd help a lot if I _could _make the car super fast."

"We'd draw too much attention," Marluxia cooly said, "and we don't want any of that, do we, Love?"

Larxene snarled, ignoring him. "How does the Sexman put his limits on _you, _Flower Boy?"

His blue eyes narrowed. He purred, "Why…I'm just not as reckless as you is all."

A mixture of a screech and an _inhuman_ growl escaped her lips. "I can't _believe_ they convinced me to marry and have _sex _with something like you."

"Alllll for the sake of science, my love," the salmon-haired man sighed indifferently, "Just so we could have dear little Naminé."

"And what a success she turned out to be," Larxene added, dressing herself in a fake smile, "Oh, Marluxia! I've always _dreamed _of birthing a little girl from my vagina who instantly goes blind and murders people with _crayons_! Haven't you?"

Marluxia scowled, dropping his hands in disbelief. "I didn't think your voice could get any more excruciating."

Larxene glowered. "Gee, thanks."

"Turn here."

She spun around. "_Excuse _me?"

"Turn _here_, I can feel them!"

Larxene's eyes flashed in understanding and she turned right obediently.

Marluxia's power wasn't exactly clairvoyance. It was more along the lines of…anything within a mile radius of him that was a plant and was alive was himself. Connected to him. With just a simple push of the mind, he could have crushed your body like a boa constrictor crushes a mouse, simply using part of him – a nearby tree root. He could make vines and grass and weeds spread like wildfire and grow rapidly around one's body. It sounded ridiculous at first, but Larxene learned not to laugh at him. Roses had thorns.

A year or so back, Larxene recalled one circumstance where people were cutting down trees to clear the area and add on to The Org's facilities. Marluxia spent the entire day in bed, writhing and screaming in pain as if his limbs were being cut through with a saw. He was equally cursed with this power as he was blessed.

So Marluxia had eyes, ears, just plain _nerve-endings_ everywhere. It wasn't clairvoyant – it was _better_ than clairvoyant. Larxene was basically useless unless she had a great source of electricity. She could only harness as much as she was given. Even so, she hardly ever tried to see what would happen if she just…let it go. She usually kept it in the appliance it was contained in and went from there. People got hurt when she let it go.

But sometimes people deserved to get hurt.

She pulled up in front of a motel with a sign that burned the neon-pink letters VA A CY into her eyes. Marluxia was practically brimming with excitement as she popped open his door and they climbed out, scanning the rooms swiftly with their eyes before heading over to the reception desk.

__01__02__03__04__05__06__07__08__09__010__011__012__013__

It was disgusting. Roxas went to go take a shower as Axel, Demyx, and Zexion congregated in the room and…it was disgusting. Out of a slight crack in the wall, a thin, green trail climbed up the mushy wet tiles of the shower walls. Roxas presumed it was some form of strange fungus, but he saw that the head of it was moving forward in a slow crawl. A snake? No, snakes didn't have…

What the hell, _thorns_?

"Axel!" Roxas called, keeping a close eye on the steadily slithering vine, "Was this rose vine always here?"

Not Axel, but Zexion appeared through the door, his one visible eye wide as it traveled to the growing plant body.

"Shit," he whispered, rushing back into the main room.

"It isn't one of your illusions, is it?" Roxas asked, attempting to reassure himself as he followed the slate-haired boy out to the rest of the company.

"No, definitely not." He regarded Demyx with a panicked expression. "Marluxia's here. We need to run."

"Marluxia's…?" Demyx began, gasping and unable to say anymore.

"Who the hell is _Marluxia_?" Axel asked, rolling the name off his tongue as if it definitely didn't belong in the world.

"We'll explain later," Zexion growled, "Let's just _go_!"

Axel and Roxas, confused at all the worrying, shrugged and followed Zexion into the damp spring air. It had stopped raining, but the sun was beginning to set and the air was starting to flow with the buzzing, pink, fluorescent light of the motel.

"Can we get a cab?" Demyx asked as they traveled down the rooms toward the stairs.

"We don't have any money!" Zexion croaked as they descended the stairs with several resonating clinks of feet. They walked across the sidewalk swiftly, a stray clump of crab grass rustling under Roxas's right foot. Zexion flinched. "_Don't touch any plants_!"

Roxas's leg rebounded and he shivered, nodding. The four of them power walked down the parking lot, everyone careful not to step on any blade of grass peeking through the cement cracks or to have their hands brush the sides of bushes. Demyx nudged Zexion with his elbow and did a double take toward the parking lot once they were standing at the side of the highway, whispering, "Isn't that the car they were chasing us in?"

Zexion looked back at the forest green Cadillac and nodded as he tried to flag down a taxi.

"You mean you guys were being chased _too_?" Axel asked, a spark of anger in his voice.

"_Are_." Zexion promptly corrected as a cab finally pulled over for them.

"So you just lead _more_ of them to Roxas and I!?"

Zexion ignored him as he climbed into the backseat of the yellow car, quickly followed by Demyx and Roxas. Axel grumbled before cramming in with them.

"Where to?" the driver asked. He was a huge black man with intricate tattoos up his bulking arms. Roxas coughed in protest at the scent of his brooding cigar.

"The airport." Zexion quickly said. It was the farthest place he could think of without being too far for the driver. He hoped.

"The _airport_?" his square jaw nearly lost hold of his cigar, ashes flicking off dangerously, "Ya gotta be shittin' me! That's nearly two or three hours away!"

Zexion grumbled, shoving his hand into his pocket and pulling out…nothing. But it looked as if he was pantomiming a hold on a delicate, thin piece of paper. His eyes were staring, in a fog.

"They're coming, Zexy…" Demyx moaned as he watched Larxene and Marluxia push out of reception, heading toward them in a fast walk.

"I'm going to give you a _five-hundred _dollar bill, Sir," Zexion stated loudly, nudging the man in the shoulder with his invisible cash, "_Please_, just take us to the airport."

"They're getting closer!" Axel whispered harshly. Zexion was trembling violently as the driver took the air dollar into his hulking hand.

"Holy _shit_, you serious, Mister?"

Roxas whimpered. He could see the blue in Marluxia's raging eyes as grass blades slowly curled against the windows.

"Yes! Now _go_!"

There was something sharp and commanding in Zexion's words that was more than just tone. Demyx even cried out when he felt the rush of energy go past his ear from Zexion's mind, directing at their driver. The tires skidded and they were all pushed roughly back into their seats, minor vines snapping, as they broke free.

Zexion's heart was palpitating fast as he kept his gaze steady, intent. The palms of his hands were mashed into his forehead as he concentrated on the dollar bill, President McKinley's facial features, the intricate design around it's border, the watermark, the dirty, washed out look, and he couldn't lose his absorption on the way it felt in the black man's burly hand as he steered. He tilted his head in time with the steady sway of his hand to stay focused.

In times like this, Zexion often delved into his past to forget about the clenching vice around his head he felt while administering his power…not to mention the blood rapidly seeping out of his nose (though Demyx took it upon himself to hold the smaller's nose with a fresh napkin stolen from a case in the cab). As his ears sung to him off key and in muffled, worried lyrics, he began to remember those six years ago…

…where this all began.


	3. Remember

The leader of the experiment, Dr. Webb, had reserved three separate rooms for the experiment, assigning each individual volunteer to his or her bed. There were two beds in each room, yet in the room the young, blonde nurse had told Zexion to go in already held three people, one bed with a tall, teenage boy holding a blonde elementary school kid in his lap. Zexion shook his head. _Pedophile_.

The only bed with room – or that should've had room – was occupied by a handsome, sleeping beauty. The bluenette huffed, crossing his arms and shifting his weight to his left hip. Said beauty's limbs were hanging limply off the edges of the bed, the sheets in heaps over his body and his mouth hanging open, snoring softly.

"Demyx!" the redheaded pedophile called, "We have _company_!"

"Huwuh…?" Demyx half-babbled, half-yawned. His sea-green eyes found Zexion studying him with an impatient stare and he started, shuffling over with a quick, "I'm sorry!"

Zexion cocked his head and let out a sneering laugh. "I didn't want to share a bed with you necessarily. I was just observing from afar."

The tallest in the opposite bed snorted, gesturing toward the small child sitting on his knee. "You remind me of little Roxy here – you're so cute and little, but you have a big mouth."

The slate-haired teen blushed angrily along with the younger blonde as the older, more experienced blonde giggled. "Yeah, he's so cute! And he's so red, Axy. I think he _liiiikes_ you."

"_What_!?" Zexion growled, eruptions of laughter breaking out as he nearly turned the color of"Axy's" hair. "That's ludicrous! I would _never _have affections for someone of the same gender as me!"

The redhead laughed again – his throaty, deep laugh. "'Ludicrous'? Dude…how old are you?"

Zexion pulled the ends of his sleeves nervously. "Thirteen."

"No wonder. Kids like you don't know how to use their 'big words' properly."

"I'm _properly_ eloquent, thank you very much."

"It's not the eighteenth century anymore, kid."

Zexion fumed while Demyx and Axel merely smiled and chortled in response.

During all the forced "companionship", Zexion finally surrendered to sitting beside Demyx in the small hospital cot. The small boy known as Roxas eventually piped up for the first time in his high, elementary voice.

"Why are we here, Axy?"

Axel stroked the boy's soft spikes gingerly as if the child was a fragile kitten. "It's a thousand dollars, Roxy. _One thousand dollars _a pop. We get a full two thousand bucks for taking on either water or this…whatever the hell it is."

"The hallucinogen?" Zexion asked, "Don't we get a fifty-fifty chance on whether or not the drip will contain water or not?"

"I think so…" Demyx mused, "Jeesh, I can't stand needles though. Even if it _is _just water."

"But you need the money, Dem." Axel told him seriously, "_We _need the money." He opened his mouth to continue, but remembered Zexion was in the room and shut it back up to keep their privacy.

"What does the…whatever that word is do?" Roxas asked curiously, off subject. He was nervous. Axel could feel his hammering heart under his petite ribcage.

"That's what they're trying to figure out, Roxy," the redhead answered, soothing him by planting a chaste kiss on his forehead, "but don't worry. They tested it on several people before us and made sure that it was safe. Once they get the IV in you, the worst is over."

Oh God, how Axel wished that was true six years from then.

Dr. Vexen Webb lived up to his doctor name in everything from his looks to his mannerisms. His skin was sallow and his curtains of vomit-yellow hair fell just below his shoulders. His eyes were emerald-green and seemed to threaten on bursting out of their sockets whenever he raised an eyebrow or two.

He held a clipboard to his chest and frequently took notes on God knows what. He took a rather long and angry note when Axel said he looked like a mutated fetus.

After he had briefed the four of them about the minor known side-effects of the unnamed hallucinogen – dizziness, headaches, and of course hallucinations – he apologized for the lack of room and ushered two nurses into the room, Zexion recognizing the young blonde one from earlier that day. They worked simultaneously on Demyx and Zexion, holding out their arms and finding their veins with cold, slender fingers. Demyx whined when his nurse missed the vein and had to prick him again.

Axel swore when he was stuck with the needle, whining incessantly – a big baby compared to Roxas. The blonde merely blinked when he was stuck with the drip, feeling whatever warm fluid he received travel up his arm and into the whole of his circulatory system.

Time had slowed down instantly, but at the same time it went by faster than anything Roxas had ever experienced. He felt like he was sleeping, but his eyes were open and he could view the clouds passing by, tossing shadows through the window. Dr. Webb morphed back into the room momentarily after hours, months, years, seconds, in a hazy fog, heading down the line of teenagers (and Roxas), asking each one in turn how they felt.

"Bubbly." Demyx replied with a faint, serene smile, causing Zexion to erupt into spastic fits of laughter that didn't suit him at all. No one gave him weird looks or even gave him a second thought as he was asked how he felt.

"Are we going to shrink yet?" Zexion asked in response. The doctor cocked an eyebrow.

"Do you…feel like you're shrinking?"

Zexion laughed hysterically, each lick of mirth sounding reminiscent of a bloodcurdling shriek. "You're getting taller and taller and I-I'm getting s-smaller!"

Webb merely took a small note as a towering nurse wiped at the hot liquid running out of Zexion's flaring nostrils. He shook, his eyes wide.

Axel was unusually quiet and mellow. He groggily told the doctor that he felt slight pressure, slipping in and out of consciousness rapidly. The brunette nurse noticed the flushed look in his face and took his temperature. 100.07 degrees Fahrenheit.

Roxas wasn't much better. His mind flashed inane pictures across his field of vision as he held the covers to his nose, his eyes wide with fear as he shivered.

"And how do _you_ feel, son?"

The voice was different – more monotone and cool than Dr. Webb's. Roxas looked into his orange slits staring down at him through wisps of silver. He was stooped over, his knee on the young boy's small, milky thigh in an instant. Where'd the blanket--?

Fingers like spiders trailed up his cheeks and pushed at the base of his eyeballs, squeezing the content out of them as Roxas screamed shockingly, "_**My eyes! He's pulling my eyes out! Axel, I can't see! I CAN'T SEE!!**__"_

No one did anything as he felt his eyes deflate like leaking eggs and he thrashed under the man's hold. Zexion watched the scene, giggling as Roxas clawed at the empty crevices in his face. The weight instantly lifted from the bed. He felt the warm blood sopping in between his fingers and went to grab for Axel, but the next thing he knew, his eyes were open again. He could see. Dr. Webb was above him, smiling sadistically.

"Have a nice nap?"

"Where's Xemnas?" the child growled back at him, "Where is he? He took my eyes. I want them back."

"_Xemnas_?"

"Y-yeah. He had orange eyes and gray hair. He wanted my eyes, s-so he took them."

Axel chuckled softly in his throat, turning his head to look at Roxas with clouded eyes. "You goin' crazy, Roxy? You still have your eyes. Can't you see anything?"

Roxas exercised his eyes a bit, looking from Webb's impatient look to the tiled ceiling, then back to the window. It was nighttime. He nodded.

"Right, Xemnas…" Webb mumbled to himself as he took a note on his clipboard, "None of the people who work in The Org have this name 'Xemnas', I'll assure you. No one has orange eyes or gray hair either. You dreamed him up."

"But I saw him too!" Zexion shouted in defense, "Roxas had blood all over his fingers because he was clawing at where his eyes were before."

Dr. Webb snorted, shaking his head as he took another extensive note. "You two just shared hallucinations. Nothing major."

"Dr. Webb, that's impossible." Zexion sounded frank. "Roxas and I haven't met until today. How could we share the same exact hallucination if we never had past experiences with each other?"

Dotting his i's and j's pronouncedly, Dr. Webb replied, "With what you have, Mr. Harris, I wouldn't doubt that you two shared 'hallucinations' in the least bit."

In a sweeping motion of his shining blonde hair, he exited the room.

__01__02__03__04__05__06__07__08__09__010__011__012__013__

Zexion's eyes were fluttering as he felt the image and feeling of the dirty, green dollar flicker in and out. How long had it been? It felt like days, weeks…

minutes

only a few more minutes

zexy

hang in there

we're almost there

The vice that was straining harder and harder against his skull, so much he feared it would crack under the pressure. Five hundred dollars…five hundred dollars…five…hundred…was it Franklin or McKinley? The paper was undecided as the patterns and textures swirled. The driver ran his thumb questioningly over its surface.

Zexion's hands went limp and fell to his sides, his head lolling. Demyx pushed his head back up by the nose and his cloth, but his eyes were dead and staring. His breaths were shallow.

"Zexionnn…" Axel whispered, waving a hand in front of Zexion's face. The teenager blinked and tried to focus on the frame of the dollar, but it began to fizzle and die. The driver's hand twitched in response. Demyx groaned, his handkerchief sopping red.

"He's losing it," the mulleted boy whined, "He won't be able to hold it much longer."

"Why couldn't he just make him _think_ we paid him?" Axel asked, holding Roxas with one arm as if he feared the Apocalypse.

"Making fake memories is way harder than this!" the boy cried in frustration. Their driver spun his head around agitatedly.

"What's all the yellin' about?"

Zexion's view of the imaginary dollar completely lost itself and the boy panicked, the small shock finally sending him into unconsciousness…and the dollar vanished completely.

"_Christ_!!" The driver exclaimed, noticing instantly. His cigar fell from his mouth, peppering ashes everywhere and singeing the top of Roxas's sneaker. The young boy quickly drew his knees up to his chin as the man frantically looked about himself for his missing dollar that never was, completely unattached to the steering wheel. The illusion of money made a monster out of him.

"Fuck, fuck, _fuck_!" Axel exclaimed, watching as the world in front of them spun in turn with the uncontrollable steering wheel. The sky, road, and grass merged into one as the tires squealed them off the road, all of them except the comatose Zexion pulling their arms over their head, anticipating the crash as Demyx threw his body over Zexion's.

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"Axel Fox," Vexen announced, slapping a few photographs of the redheaded man on the metallic table. "He's a case of pyrokinesis. In other words, he can set anything he puts his mind to on fire."

"Sweet." Xigbar chuckled, his arms crossed as he leaned back in his stool.

"_No_, it's not 'sweet'," the doctor hissed, "The boy is short-tempered and anything that really pisses him off knocks the first domino down. Once he let's go, he can't control the rest of what happens."

Xigbar raised his eyebrows and whistled as a picture of a sporty looking teenager with a snazzy mullet was slapped over Axel's. It wasn't as recent, his hair a lot shorter than it was at that present time.

"Awww, he's cute."

Vexen grunted, placing a jagged finger on the boy's face. "Demyx Bowie. He can control any form of H20 with his mind."

"Neat."

"He could pull all of the water out of your body, dehydrating you if he really wanted to."

Xigbar smiled. "Neater."

"Mr. Crutch, I don't think you're taking this job seriously enough!"

Xigbar Crutch regarded Vexen Webb with a solemn stare, raising a slight eyebrow and placing his chin on his palm. "Perhaps you're underestimating me, Old Man. Perhaps this indifferent façade is all part of the effect. What do you expect me to do? Cower in fear at each one of their powers? Wouldn't that be…I dunno, a _bad _thing since I'm supposed to be capturing the four of them?"

Vexen regarded the one eagle eye watching him with disgust, huffing haughtily through his nose. "You have a point. Moving on…" he placed a school picture of a, for a lack of a better word, emo kid wearing too much eyeliner and with his long bangs covering the right side of his face. He wasn't smiling.

"This is Zexion Harris." Vexen explained, "He has the ability to create illusions, but it's quite the intricate procedure. He has to invade someone's mind and concentrate on the look, color, scent, feeling, everything regarding whatever the illusion is. He can't go very far with this power, but six years ago when first exposed to the hallucinogen that started this whole thing, his power was far greater. He performed an illusion on himself that made him feel as if he were _shrinking_…"

Xigbar snorted at this, stopping quickly once Dr. Webb shot him a nasty glare.

"He also had a bit of an effect on this one, Roxas Hart."

This picture was of an incredibly small child wearing a sweater that the boy practically floated it, whispering around his knees and the edges of the sleeves nearly touching the ground.

"Christ, that kid looks like he just got out of pre-school!" Xigbar gasped, speculating the picture with a jagged finger over the small boys visage.

"He's eight in this photograph, Mr. Crutch. He wore such baggy clothing because he was an orphan who used to live on the streets and was taken up by Axel Fox."

"Fox didn't have the money to dress him properly?"

"Clearly."

"Ah."

Vexen moved the picture of Zexion back into view, continuing his explanation. "Zexion also put Roxas under an apparently very horrifying illusion of the leader of the Org, Xemnas, pulling his eyes out. His screams were mind-numbing. So, apparently, when put under an accumulative dosage of our unnamed hallucinogen, Zexion can perform incredible illusions that can nearly drive people into insanity."

"So…has he seen Xemnas before?" Xigbar asked, cocking his head to the side.

"According to our records, no. This also proves the boy has a bit of psychic ability."

"Huh." Xigbar turned his eyes back on the image of Roxas. "What's the cute little button do?"

"We're not one hundred percent sure on that, you see." Vexen took the old photograph in his fingers, studying it longingly. "All we know is that he can heal wounds, but in return he's given temporary pain that reflects said wound. Xemnas supposes his power far surpasses what we think and that he has great potential, and I agree, but most of the workers here disagree -- he's only a child."

Xigbar took the picture from Vexen's grasp, cradling it in his rough hands. Those blue orbs enticed him greatly. He was so adorable, so beautiful…so innocent. Such a child.

"We were thinking if we couldn't find anything within him that was really our worth, we'd just do away with him."

Xigbar's eye flashed.

"You mean, you're going to _kill _him?" Xigbar's tone was that of a child suspecting Santa was coming early. There was one thing that Xigbar was fascinated in more than anything…

And that was death.


	4. Repair

Zexion awoke to his headache slowly melting away, his arms loosely wrapped around Demyx's neck and his forehead against the back of his shoulder. They were walking…well, Demyx was walking. There was the occasional backwash of a car, whipping around Zexion's sweat-doused hair.

It wasn't until he asked, "Where are Roxas and Axel?" in a cracking voice that Zexion noticed a small, cold hand was lightly touching his left temple.

"They're here, Zexy." Demyx whispered, "Roxy's fixing your headache."

The four of them were traveling at a steady speed down the highway at the dead of night, aglow under the pools of orange light, flashing under the passing headlights. Zexion moaned and clenched his eyes shut against the constant blinking lights in the night.

They had crashed into a pole – a streetlight, and the driver was perfectly fine by physical means. However, his eyes were glazed over as if he had seen death, and his face suffered constant convulsions. Demyx thought he even heard him mumble something about "Marlene" and "schoolin'". He assumed Zexion's illusion had ricocheted in his mind, causing him to destroy himself from the inside out.

Then they were walking across the side of the highway, basically unharmed. The crash was merely jarring and nothing else.

"Ah…!" Roxas breathed, feeling a stab of pain in his temple as he removed his fingers from Zexion's forehead. The slate-haired boy's headache was gone – transferred to the young blonde.

"Let me down, Demyx. I can walk."

Demyx looked at the small illusionist on his back before letting him slide down. He gave him a quick peck on the forehead. The teenager blushed, giving Demyx a playful nudge. He didn't enjoy displaying his relationship in public, but Axel and Roxas didn't seem to notice or care. In fact, Axel removed his hand from his pocket and looped it around Roxas's shoulders, delivering his head a soothing kiss as well to help the ringing pain.

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Axel's temperature had remained steadily on 100.7, worrying the nurses but greatly intriguing Vexen. Axel kept telling them all that he felt perfectly fine over and over, sick of them shoving thermometers into his unwilling mouth.

Vexen brought a tray of flaky woodchips to him once, to which the Fox raised an eyebrow. "Hospital food much?"

Dr. Webb faked laughter. "No, Mr. Fox. I want you to burn them."

Shooting the doctor a confused look, Axel went to reach for the lighter in his pocket, pulling it out and bringing it to the tray, but Vexen's hands stopped him.

"Ah-ah-ah!" he pushed Axel's hand to his chest. "You won't be needing that."

Axel narrowed his eyes, flicking the doctor's hands off of his. "Are you crazy?"

His smile sent a chill down Axel's spine. "To a degree."

Axel didn't light a fire that time, but Vexen carefully noted the rise in temperature in the room as he left.

He had trouble with Demyx, bringing dominoes for him to knock down without his hands and studying all the words he spoke, which were unusually few. It wasn't until a nurse brought him a jug of water that he noticed the type, and extent, of his power.

The boy pulled the straw out, studying it fleetingly before tossing it over his shoulder. Then he plugged up the hole at the top by mashing down hard with his finger. Vexen ceased his note-writing to view the unusual activity as what little humidity in the air began to vibrate.

The ice water in the plastic jug expanded, becoming thinner but at the same time wider, imitating Vexen's bulging green emeralds. The plastic began to bloat up like a balloon filling with helium. Vexen shielded himself with his clipboard when it began to hiss and finally explode in several chunks of transparent plastic, but the droplets stayed suspended in the air, hovering and rotating. Zexion shivered, his eyes large and obviously asking "Did I do that?"

"What the _fuck_!?" Axel angrily exclaimed as he came out of his nap, holding a reddening mark on his cheek. "Who threw that piece of shit at me?"

He gave an accusing look to Dr. Webb, glaring angrily. The doctor sputtered, throwing his arms up in surrender. He could feel the temperature in the room shoot up as he began to sweat.

"_Fuck_, it hurts!" Axel clenched his eyes shut, caressing the bleeding cut on his cheek. His mind sent out a spark of heat. Vexen flared his nostrils, backing away even more with his arms up as the scent of something singing came to his nose.

Axel _did _light a fire that time, but it wasn't in a metal tray of woodchips. It was the bottom of Vexen's coat. The bottom of Vexen's coat was on _fire_.

A great sense of urgency filled the room as Vexen stammered, flapping his coat around comically. Zexion fell into a shocking spell of laughter once again. Axel gritted his teeth, not even paying attention to his work. Demyx's clouded eyes developed worry as he held the water droplets in the air, sending them all in colonies into the licking fire. With a sizzling crackle, the fire was out. His lab coat was smoking, but it was out.

In a trembling shock, Dr. Webb fled to go change out of his smoldering attire.

The only one left in the room who hadn't shown any sign of unusual abilities derived from the drug was the little one – Roxas. It pleased the doctor that such a small specimen would introduce itself to his experiment, but the boy's pituitary activity was far lower than that of the others, and the hallucinogen rested its power in the pituitary gland specifically. If Dr. Vexen Webb believed in the human soul, he would believe it resided in this particular gland. That's why he chemically created this drug to specifically target this area – his mere favor and fascination of the thing.

But Roxas was only a child – an _eight_-year-old child that didn't have as much pituitary activity as his fifteen- and thirteen-year-old counterparts. Maybe the drug would only come into effect once the boy reached puberty. Maybe the drug would stunt his growth completely and nothing more. Whatever the outcome, Vexen was interested, but convinced that the boy had no abnormal abilities _yet_.

That's what the doctor theorized, until he returned to the room in his fresh, white coat and noticed Axel's previously nicked cheek was completely unscathed. Vexen's mouth ran a mile a minute, attempting to get a closer look at Axel's pristine alabaster cheek, but the pyro squirmed under the attention. Vexen eventually managed to ask in the normal, English language, "_How_?"

"Roxas."

The doctor directed his eyes toward the boy. He was sleeping uncomfortably, his brow furrowed as if in pain, his cheek cupped in his hand. Carefully, Dr. Webb removed that hand from the boy's face, starting once he found a mark identical to the one Axel previously had. The small boy twitched under the man's touch.

Vexen took the liberty of taking his temperature, widening his eyes at the reading – 100.7. The exact same as Axel's. He had another nurse take Axel's temperature to see if his fever had gone down, but no – it had stayed completely the same.

The gash had been transferred, but the fever had been _copied_. What did it mean?

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"Who were those people after you guys anyhow?" Axel had finally managed to ask. The hours of the night were waning as the sun's light crept into the sky, dying the clouds a milky, dark blue.

"Marluxia and Larxene Rose." Demyx answered, "Two people with The Org. They've been after us for a while."

"Huh." Axel nodded in understanding. "So what's with the whole plant thing? I was under the impression The Org was _after_ people like us – not in _league _with them."

"It's more or less of both it seems." Zexion mumbled. "Trust me, we don't get it either. Marluxia, the pink-haired one, can control plants, obviously. Larxene, the girl…something to do with electricity."

"That was a _girl_?" Axel laughed, "Geez, no woman's ever screamed 'lesbian' to me more than _that_…not to mention that Marluxia guy. Talk about 'Gay' with a capital 'G'."

"Heh, like you're one to talk." Roxas shot with a sly smirk, receiving a rough noogie from Axel's fist.

"Seriously, though," Zexion interrupted the light moment with his heavy tone of solemnity, "Those two are dangerous, _especially_ Marluxia. That man was dangerous before he even got that power of his."

"Why?" Axel asked, "What happened?"

Zexion sighed, Demyx squeezing him on the shoulder. The two exchanged worried glances that said so many words that only lovers could share between eyes. "He…took my virginity but…not consensually. I was twelve."

Axel huffed through his nose. "Hm. Figured as much."

There was a dull silence as the foursome listened to the sounds of the sunrise, the highway slowly gaining more vehicles, the birds beginning their low calls between trees. After passing a great few telephone polls, Demyx stopped them with an outstretched hand.

"We're not gonna get anywhere just walking around like this, guys." He pointed out smartly. "We need to remember – a whole government agency is on the look out for us."

"You're right…" Roxas agreed. "The sun's out now – they could spot us easier, but…how do you suggest we travel faster?"

"Why don't we just hitchhike?" Axel asked indifferently, shrugging.

"Are you kidding?" Roxas snapped, "With our luck, the first person to stop would be a person from The Org!"

"It's risky, but it's our best bet." Zexion broke the tension with his cool voice and misty stare. "It's worth a try."

Demyx smiled his thank you and jutted out his thumb, waiting for a passing car to stop tentatively with his comrades, all holding their breath.

After a full five minutes, a large, black SUV pulled beside them, the window on the passenger side rolling down mechanically. A young man around Axel's and Demyx's age was seen studying them with teal slits through curtains of silver hair. He raised his eyebrows once he got a good look at the colorful bunch before him, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as he contemplated whether he wanted the four of them in his car.

"Need a ride?" he asked.


	5. Rethink

A/N: Is it wrong that I love Xigbar in this story? I'm sorry, but it's true. He's just so freakin' awesome. Anyhow, sorry for the delay. I like myself some procrastination.

The young man who picked the four comrades up introduced himself as Riku – Riku Kagi. He rested his left arm on the door and used his right hand to steer as he leaned rather far back in his chair, asking without a glance toward the passenger seat, which held Axel, or into his rearview mirror, "Sooo…where's the circus?"

Demyx answered with a frown, "We're not going to a circus. We didn't come from one either…"

"Right…" Riku nodded, "Totally explains the clown up here in the front seat with the teardrops under his eyes and the midget right behind me."

Roxas growled, blushing angrily. He didn't like this guy. Axel merely shrugged off the sarcasm, saying somehow placidly, "We just need a place to stay. There isn't a motel or hotel very close within walking distance so –"

"There isn't one in driving distance either." Riku finished for him, "I'll just take you back to my house. So what's with the lack of bags? On the run from the government?"

Demyx laughed a little too nervously, meriting a raised eyebrow from Riku. Axel covered it up with, "All our stuff was in the car as it was towed."

"Ah. That's a shame…so are you heading anywhere in particular?"

"Yeah, Radiant Garden." Zexion chimed in. Radiant Garden was far from where they were – far north. "My sister just had a baby."

Demyx looked at his boyfriend questioningly. He didn't _have _a sister, or niece or a nephew, but he was stopped with a small elbow in the stomach. Riku didn't notice, answering with, "I _see_."

"That's a little too north of here to drive today, isn't it?" Axel asked, "So we can just stay with you for the night, right? And then we'll be out of your hands after tonight. What do you say?"

Riku shrugged. "Fine with me. Our house has plenty of room. Just Sora and I are living there at the moment."

"Aww, is Sora your girlfriend?" Demyx asked with a smile.

"Heh…" Riku grumbled, "Boyfriend."

"Oh…" Demyx frowned at this response, quickly rebounding by looping his arm around Zexion and saying, "It's all right. I have my boyfriend right here – have for about five years!"

Something lit up in Riku's teal eyes. Somehow, he knew he could trust these people. Somewhat of a smile crossed his lips. "Great. Our home's just up the dirt road here. We'll be there in no time."

Their home was a large estate situated in the middle of nowhere, explaining the lack of concrete road. Roxas half-expected to see hens and a roosters strutting across the yard once they rolled up to the large, white home, but instead was surprised to see a bundle of small Yorkshire puppies sniffing around at the ground. They jerked their heads up at the arrival of the large SUV, yipping at Riku's ankles once he emerged from the vehicle.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm home," he grumbled, whacking a few half-heartedly with his plastic grocery bag he retrieved from the trunk. Roxas and Zexion stepped tentatively out, both skittish around dogs, small and yippy or not.

"They won't bite, you know." Riku informed them, heading up the front steps to the door, "They will if you –"

He was interrupted by the sound of Axel emerging from the car and stepping on one of the dogs' tails.

"—step on them."

"Whoops." Axel shrugged it off as the brown and black dog bowed its head, growling at his ankles. He shook his head, kicking the annoyance softly away.

Riku laughed slightly, opening the front door and calling to the gang, "Come on in – Sora should be home. He loves company."

"We have company?"

A boy with cinnamon-brown hair emerged from the inside of the house, leaning forward to look wildly around outside and stop his eyes on the four newcomers. He beamed openly, but shot Riku a confused look as if to say, "Why didn't you _tell_ me? I could've cooked something for all of them!" The apron said it all – he was definitely the more feminine of the relationship.

"Well, don't just stand there you guys!" he laughed, "Come on in! Oh, and the dogs too. I forgot to feed them."

"You always forget to feed them, Sora…" Riku mumbled, shaking his head.

The inside of the home was vast, but still comfortable. The first thing they found themselves walking into was a kitchen with a small round table and a checkerboard cloth over it. Sora started at the sight of it, asking Riku if he could get the leaf to fit in the middle and a few extra chairs. Riku obliged as Sora hurried into the kitchen to "cook" more to the meal he had prepared – just…cereal.

"Never caught your names…" Sora started as he finally settled down at the table with everyone else, all of them sitting at different heights due to their variety of chairs. Roxas nearly sat as high as Demyx. Axel looked toward the brunette and smiled warmly.

"Lea," he answered, "It's spelled like the girl name – Lee-uh, but it's pronounced _Lee_."

Roxas looked up. His usual fake name was, ironically, Sora, but Axel seemed to cover for him before he opened his mouth, although to Roxas's deepest dislike.

"This is my boyfriend – Rosa."

Holy God, he could've collided his forehead with his bowl of cereal right then and there, but –

"My name's Myde." Demyx chimed in, quickly followed by Zexion's dull, "Ienzo."

"Ee-en-zoh?" Sora cocked his head to the side as he eyed his spoonful of Cap'N Crunch. "That's a weird name."

"Well, I blame my parents. They weren't in their right minds." Zexion shook his head, toying around with the contents of his bowl with the tip of his spoon.

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Saïx Harris, one of the two parents that Zexion was speaking of, was casually leading a squad of police cars up north, the passenger seat beside him occupied by a hulk of a figure, forlornly seated in his cushioned chair.

The two of these men were more guinea pigs of Vexen Webb's experiment, although their side effects were slight. Saïx Harris merely had trouble in the sunlight, burning easily and having trouble adjusting his eyes to light. A pair of shades balanced keenly on his nose as he gripped the steering wheel, catching small glances of his silent partner.

"Lexaeus, right?" he asked through the joint jutting from his mouth. Drugs – that was one thing that diluted the effects of the hallucinogen. Drugs upon drugs upon drugs. Never did any good. The dark blue eyes of Lexaeus Smith found those seemingly glowing yellow ones as he tried to find his breath through the rancid smoke.

"Yessir," Lexaeus spoke in a voice far gentler than he first seemed, "I've been sent with you as your bodyguard, remember?"

"I remember…" Saïx moaned, "I'm not _that _high, jeesh. So…bodyguard, huh? What'd the drug do to you? Just steroid you up?"

"It acted like a steroid, yes." Lexaeus replied, folding his hands on top of one another. "My muscle mass has increased and my strength even more so. It'll be useful, though – apparently our targets of capture are exceedingly dangerous."

"Mmf." Saïx grunted, "One of 'em's my sleazy excuse for a son."

"I'm…sorry, Sir." The sympathy was lacking greatly in the giant's voice, though he tried to mimic it. "Did you two go into the experiment together?"

"No." Saïx took in a slow, quivering breath before continuing. "I told him about the Project on a whim, just telling him what I was doing, you know? Next thing I know, he goes out one night without my permission and gets injected. It was kinda hard for him to hide it – the drug hit him hard. He kept yelling at people that weren't there…but he was raising money to get his own apartment so he could get away from me. God, the kid…the kid was only thirteen. Long story short, shit hit the fan and I ended kicking him to the streets anyway."

Lexaeus's eyes widened. "_Why_?"

"It doesn't matter anymore." Saïx quickly belted out. "'S far as I know, he's not my son anymore."

"_Lexaeus?_"

They were interrupted by the crackling voice of Marluxia sounding through the walkie-talkie on Lexaeus's hip. He scrambled for it and answered, "Lexaeus here. What is it, Marluxia? Over."

"_Are you still on the highway_?"

"Coming up on Exit 5. And you should say over when you're _over_ you know, Marluxia. Over."

"_You know when I'm 'over' when I stop talking, Lexaeus. And exit there and turn on Moore Street – that's where they are_."

"Whatever you say, Sir. Are you sure? Over."

There was a long pause as Saïx turned on Exit 5, when Larxene's voice crackled in.

"_We blockaded every other road. Besides, we caught wind that they were seen climbing into a black SUV heading in that direction. Over._"

Lexaeus sighed before answering, "We'll be right there. Are you guys going to be there too? Over."

Silence. Then Larxene hissed in sadistically, "_I wouldn't miss it for the world_. _Over._"

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"Why's it even _called _Project 013 anyway?"

Vexen looked up from his paperwork at Xigbar sprawled out on his sofa. He wished the man would just leave already. He even slept in the middle of his office floor for the night like an annoying stalker. "Was it thirteen people who got injected or something?"

"It was performed on the thirteenth floor of St. Luna's Hospital."

"Huh." Xigbar half-laughed as he twiddled with the stress ball of the Earth in his hand, "Funny. Last time I went to that hospital, there were only ten floors."

Vexen's pen-scratching on paper had ceased. He was frozen.

"Who were the other seven victims of the experiment, Old Man?"

Vexen shook his head and stuttered, "There a-aren't any others. It's just those six – Roxas, Zexion, Demyx, Axel, Xaldin, and Luxord."

The scientist practically shrieked when his chin was grasped and forced upward by a leather-clad hand. Xigbar's yellow eagle eye gleamed in front of Vexen's face. "All the one's you've told me so far…they all have _x's _in their names. All of them. Is there a catch? Do the others have them as well?"

"I-it's just a coincidence." Vexen stammered, his chin, pushing against the leather hand with every syllable, "_X's _are common in names theses days, you know how it is it –"

"So I was right!" Xigbar laughed, "All the others have _x_'s too. That would mean…" he removed his hand from the pointed chin to count off his fingers, "That Marluxia faggot, that Larxene dyke, Saïx, Lexaeus…andddd…" he glanced at Vexen and grinned pointedly, "…you."

What little color was left in the elder man's cheeks had left.

"I knew it. You wear gloves for a reason, don't you?" Xigbar wiggled his own gloved fingers in front of Vexen's face, "Also why you're so touchaphobic, huh? I wore gloves just so I wouldn't turn to stone or something when I grabbed you. Heh, the effects are already working on you obviously."

Vexen bowed his head, his face hidden by yellow curtains. Wavy rivulets began to swim through his hair as he began to chuckle in his throat then explode into fits of laughter. Xigbar stepped tentatively back as the older man stood up, his smirk crooked.

"You're got me, Mr. Crutch." he giggled, "You really have!" He bit the tip of his forefinger and slowly slipped his white glove off, exposing the bulging, blue trails of the back of his hand. "You know too much. You're too smart for your own good. Knowing you, you wouldn't keep anything secret, so I guess it's proper to say goodbye, given the circumstances."

With more agility than anyone could ever imagine, Vexen leaped onto his desk, scattering his research papers everywhere as he wrapped his freezing fingers around Xigbar's neck. The man gagged as he felt it. Not only was his breath diminishing and his heart beating faster, but he could feel every ounce of heat in his body travel to his face and into the icy claws of Vexen. He was thrown against a wall before he could blink.

"Painful, isn't it?" Vexen chuckled airily beside Xigbar's ear. "_Funny_ how a person doesn't realize how important heat is to them until it's escaping their body bit by bit..."

Xigbar's eyes slowly began to cloud over, even as Vexen let go of his trachea. He was shivering. He could've sworn he saw his breath, feeling his lungs crystallize. His limbs were frigid as he groped for the wall for his means of escape.

…and then something even more extraordinary and unexpected happened.

Vexen was there, caressing his victim's cheek with his thumb, when he noticed Xigbar's skin undergo a totally different kind of change. Veins, arteries, and muscle tissue became more visible as the epidermis became more transparent. A strange, crackling energy surged through the dissipating man's body as his image flickered in and out. Xigbar's jaw bone was seen for a temporary moment forming into a saber tooth grin…then his body was pulled by the chest into nothingness, like a thin piece of cloth pulled through a small hole in the wall.

Vexen blinked, wide-eyed. His bare hand was empty, tingling from the strange vibrations the man set off. He looked down at his palm, then to the pile of clothing on the ground, including an eye patch and hair tie.

Xigbar…_disappeared_? That..._that _was the one from--!?


	6. Redeem

No one could tell how many days had gone by before everyone was allowed to be sent home from the experiment that happened at St. Luna's Hospital. The drug seemed to have affected everyone's sense of time the same. It felt like mere seconds and it was all over…but at the same time, they could feel the fatigue in their muscles as they stood up for the first time in what seemed like years. Axel, Demyx, and Roxas said their brief goodbyes to Zexion as they temporarily parted ways.

Zexion couldn't get a grasp on the new ability developing within him, even as he left the hospital. The doctors told him that he should be careful what he thought about and what he interpreted as real and unreal – hallucinations could shatter a mind like his if mistaken for practicality.

His father immediately caught on once he peered at him across the breakfast table, watching his son muttering to the people supposedly swimming in his cereal bowl. Then he started screaming out of nowhere at someone named "Demyx" in the corner, telling him to stop telling him that he liked Axel. When the slate-haired boy had finally sobered up, Saïx brought him into the room for questioning, learning that, in fact, the reason he entered the experiment to raise money was to get away from him as fast as he could.

Over time, the illusions got worse and uncontrollable, especially ever since Saïx forced Advil on him for the nosebleeds. Somehow, he thought it would help, but it only seemed to magnify his power, maximizing the reoccurring apparition of Demyx, causing Zexion to eventually screech that he loved him. Oh my fucking God, he loved him. He loved all of them – the pedophile, the kid, but he loved _him _most of all. They had somehow bonded through such an interesting way, telling each other silly little nothings – _everythings _– that he couldn't even recall between all the titters he emitted at that time, but he felt them. He knew he loved him, and that was final.

The $2000 came in the mail. Almost the instant it did, his father kicked him out. He was sick of his son crying out his admittance to blatant homosexuality. He wouldn't have a gay son.

So somehow, he found Demyx. He was outside a coffee shop in the rain, tuning his strangely shaped guitar. Upon close speculation, Zexion learned it was actually a large version of the Indian instrument, the sitar. The mulletted blonde informed him that the rain seemed to sooth him ever since the experiment, and he enjoyed watching the puddles ripple with just a small push of his thought. He took his hand, holding the cold, wet hand in his somehow warm, wet hand, and led him to the apartment of Demyx, Axel, and Roxas.

Demyx and Axel already had jobs, so Zexion took one up at a coffee shop, lying about his age and saying he was fourteen. It was a desperate, tiny little place, so they didn't exactly ask for identification. The smell of warm coffee brewing, though he hated it, seemed to direct his mind away from his power, and he learned to control its sporadic behavior. Axel worked next door at a video game shop while Demyx, of course, played his sitar beautifully outside for tips. It went on for months like that, when one day they all had to work on a Saturday, no ifs, ands or buts, and Roxas had to be left home alone. Axel wouldn't have it, knowing how closely The Org had been watching them since the experiment, and insisted that the young blonde stay with his brother next door, Reno. So, as innocent as could be, Roxas was sent to Reno's to be "babysat".

However, it was a stale move. Xemnas treasured Roxas Hart. When agents discovered that he wasn't home, he assumed they were hiding his precious light. The agents flocked through the apartment building's halls, finding Reno's room, Reno promptly telling Roxas to hide in one of the dresser drawers once he recognized the face of Larxene Nymph through the peephole.

_This isn't going to end well, yo…_

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Thunder could be heard rolling high in the sky, rumbling low to the ground as to cause small trinkets on the shelves of Riku and Sora's home to clink. Axel was staring blankly at the flickering colors of the incoming news flash on the television screen, as Zexion gratefully nibbled at the edge of a slightly stale and flattened biscuit that had been offered to him by Sora, who had taken Demyx and Sora outside to help him round up all the dogs before it really started pouring down. They were having particular trouble with the smallest one, who kept slipping from their grasp. As their giggles and shouts drifted through to Axel and Zexion, who eyed the window with the softly billowing curtains, Riku peered over the refrigerator door from the kitchen.

"Either of you want a beer?" he asked, pulling out a Core's Light from the fridge's insides. Zexion shook his head and muttered something about being too young while Axel simply told him straight out that he didn't drink. Riku shrugged, bringing the bottle into the living room and setting it on the coffee table in front of Axel nonetheless. He sat back in his armchair, pulling up the footrest as he watched the news along with the other two quietly.

_-– and apparently something is going on at Moore Street tonight, police forces having blockaded the road, not letting anyone enter or exit, yet no one has tried to do either so far…_

Riku's eyes widened and he leaned forward, grasping the remote control and turning up the volume. Moore Street…that was his street. He and Sora were the only ones living on it, so…?

_-- just in, there is a compilation of cop cars going past said blockade and heading through Moore Street at this very moment. What they'll find on the other side? Tune in later for answers._

Two nearly identical looks of panic broke out on Axel's and Zexion's faces.

"I knew it." Riku said in almost sick fascination, clicking the TV set off as he stared at the sour looks of the two. "They're after you. And they'll be here any second."

There was the distant rumble of the thunder as Sora cried "Rosa! _Rosa!_" and Roxas's reaction was obviously delayed. Another light flicked on in Riku's head. "You've been using fake names, too."

"We don't have time to explain." Axel told the silverette as he stood himself up, grasping the beer bottle. He was going to need it. "Just stay inside – get Sora and everyone else inside too."

"I'm coming with you," Riku insisted, "This is my property. They have no right to trespass, government officials or not."

Axel stared at him incredulously before shaking his head, directing Zexion half-heartedly to call for Roxas and Demyx and Sora, before saying, "That's fine. Just keep in mind that you're putting your life on the line."

"I don't care. I'll get my gun."

As Sora, Roxas, and Demyx came in through the back door with question marks for faces, Axel smirked, a blazing fire in his eyes as he looked at Riku challengingly. "You won't need your gun."

Zexion appeared suddenly from the bathroom, emerging from a small canister of Advil and swallowing the abundance of pills down his throat.

"What the _hell_?" Riku exclaimed, staring at Zexion disbelievingly, "Did you just--?"

"It helps." Zexion explained, disposing of the empty casing. "It won't kill me."

Sora and Riku stared, wide-eyed as the four stepped out the front door into the rain, ready to face their enemy that had finally managed to corner them.

"We'll need you, Roxas…" Axel whispered to Roxas, entwining his fingers with the blonde's as he unconsciously shied away from the door, "We're a team. We'll do all it takes to keep them away from us. Got it memorized?"

Roxas looked hesitant, but nodded with a small, frightened coo in his throat.

A small drizzle of rain greeted them as they exited, along with a herd of cop cars, lining up along the front yard, no lights, no sirens…but they were trapped.

Axel stood there, his eyes fierce and unblinking beside Zexion, emotionless and hazy-eyed as ever. Demyx looked determined, his lips twitching only slightly out of anxiety.

Roxas was…shaking. Axel rubbed a warm circle in the back of his hand as a woman stepped out of the center car, her heels pointed enough to be used as weapon, her vivid red dress quickly dotted by the rain before she unsheathed a black umbrella, suspending it above her head and twirling it. She regarded the line of runaways with a sickly smile.

"Hello, Demyx." She smirked at the musician who managed a small, unsure smile back. "Zexion…" She walked down the line, nodding to the teenager. His eyes moved passed her, moving toward the car where a man of periwinkle hair emerged, crushing a cigarette beneath his muddy heel. "Axel…" the pyro's eyebrows inclined deeply. She stopped tracking her heels in the mud, looking up at the smallest with particular interest.

"_Hello,_ Roxas."

"Go away." Roxas growled, still quivering. Larxene crossed her arm over her breasts, doing another small twirl with her umbrella. The blue-haired man barked with laughter and the giant who surfaced after him with a large umbrella merely glanced around nervously.

"I'm afraid we can't do that, Roxy."

The four heads turned toward the other side of the center car where Marluxia, pink hair aflame, stood with his chest high, holding his own black umbrella over his head. "You see, we're supposed to take you back with us."

"You want us dead…" Zexion spoke, his eyes almost a pearly white, "You want to kill us all, you just want Roxas."

"Now, now, silly Nightingale," Zexion whimpered at the old name he was called that night, that night he was entered so violently, so – "We want you _all_ alive. We'll give you a place to stay, food to eat – "

"Why do you want us so badly?" Roxas cried. Axel squeezed his hand in warning. "What did we ever do? You did this to _us_."

"Why, Sunshine…" Axel's eyes flashed and Roxas swore he saw a few raindrops dissolve in his aura, "All we want to do is take you apart and see what makes you work."

At that instant, an outbreak of leafy vegetation sprang up Roxas's body from the base of the house, muffling his cries with a wad of leaves, pinning him to the white wall of Sora and Riku's home with a bang. Axel's hand was pried from his with a jerk of plant life, the pyro crying out Roxas's name as his muffled screams pierced through the rain, steadily growing harder.

"You son of a fucking _bitch!_" Axel howled angrily, a burst of violent energy passing through him and down the steps of the front porch, setting the pristine steps aflame and then the grass in a burning trail and –

"Axel, keep doing that!" Zexion yelled over the screams of agony exuding from Marluxia. "He's connected to all the plants around us! Put up a wall of fire so the rest of them can't get to us!"

The bonds around Roxas slowly began to shrivel like fragile, rotting skeletons. Roxas's blue planets were visible again. Axel felt the light in his heart rekindle at this sight, but didn't hesitate to turn around and start throwing heat waves all over the place – the bushes, the wildflowers, the roses, the water in the air instantly turning to steam and mixing with the black smoke.

Demyx cried out as the flame crawled across the grass and up the house, nipping near an unaware Roxas's ankles. That familiar milky film formed over his eyes and all he could see was the water falling slowly from the sky and the fire crackling around him. Quickly, carefully as he was set into his daze, he formed the small water droplets into a stream, jetting at the fire with his hands outstretched as if this would help control the trail of the liquid. The fire hissed as Roxas looked out in fright.

"Demyx!" he screamed as a man came out of the fire, his face shrouded in a helmet and glasses, hitching up his gun to shoot the mulletted boy directly in the forehead. Demyx didn't think twice, twirling his arms gracefully and showing his palms to the officer, fat water droplets stopping around him in an aura. Roxas's breathing was labored as he watched the cop smirk, about to pull at the trigger when the water droplets Demyx had gathered in his aura shot out at breakneck speeds, faster than bullets, catching the man straight in his exposed face. The man screamed, his skin burning from the several impacts, and Roxas stared as a flood of vomit and blood escaped his mouth in a filthy mess, the man collapsing to the ground like a great rag doll. Demyx screamed in anguish.

"I-I didn't want to have to do that!" he quailed, his teal eyes their normal color once again, "I didn't…I didn't…"

Roxas brought his forehead to the older boy's chest as he began to sob, his tears invisible in the rain.

"So, you ran off with the pretty boy, eh?" Saïx jeered through the rain and crackling flames to his son, still standing motionless on the patio. His hair whipped around his scowl like a ghost. "Pretty boy, pretty boy…what was his name again? _Dumbass_?"

Zexion narrowed his eyes only slightly as his father cackled, his pointed canines glinting in the firelight. Screams and yells fell through the rain as he brought up his gun, aiming straight for Demyx, but just then –

"_Riku!_" Sora cried. He cried it over and over again, his boyfriend having the unluckiest of timing and having darted out of the house with his pistol at exactly the wrong moment, collapsing on his leg. Sora dragged him over to lean against the wall with the helping hands of Demyx and Roxas. "It can't get any worse than this…" Sora whimpered and sniffed, "Riku…_Riku_…Ri--!"

And then the cars began to explode.

With a whirring scream of machinery, engines exploded in heavy bombs of bright orange and soot, metal shrapnel clinking against the shingles on the roof. Larxene's scream broke through as car after car went up, her form seen dragging an unconscious Marluxia through the havoc.

"You…" Zexion whispered to himself, staring at the guffawing Saix, "You tried to kill Demyx…"

His father's laughing instantly turned to screams as his eyes grew wild, long wires of metal blooming from the ground all around him. But…they were covered in spikes, barbs…_barbed_ wire? They danced like entranced serpents in front of him, deadly and silent, as he watched them in all directions, his mouth agape, when they plunged into his throat, ripping apart his insides. He writhed around on the ground as his organs were dislodged one by one. The ghost of a smile was cast on Zexion's face as he saw his father screaming in agony on the ground, nothing happening to him, nothing wrong…

Then something actually _did _happen – his face, in the snap of a finger, burst into flame, traveling down his body in a dancing flurry, his screams nearly inaudible under the crackling flames and pouring rain, reducing to almost nothing but a mound of smoldering rags.

Larxene was seen through the flames stuffing her husband into the car, staring off at Axel warily to check if he didn't notice their attempt to escape. His white eyes were staring right into her, delving deep inside. He traveled slowly down the steps, closer to her, just to tease her, when she slammed her palm onto the trunk of the car in front of her.

The vehicle sprang into life, its lights flashing, and its engine revving angrily, getting larger and heading straight toward Axel through the flames. Axel toppled backward as he watched the incoming car, but it slowed and stopped right before running over his feet. He stood up once again, craning his neck to catch a sight of his prey. They had vanished. He cried out in anger, more fire spitting from him in crisscrosses along the grass, more cars exploding, more faces melting –

"_Axel_…" Roxas whimpered, his hand on Riku's kneecap as he watched the back of his lover's head. Metal clinked violently on the roof. He felt his own knee begin to sear with pain.

"Axel, _stop it_."

There was the howling and whimpering of the smallest Yorkshire somewhere nearby as Zexion sank against the wall, breathing heavily. Axel laughed at his creation of destruction.

"_AXEL, FOR GOD'S SAKE, STOP!_"

Axel dropped his arms, but the flames still burned everything in sight, eating up the trees, the woodwork. The redhead's back shook as he laughed, uttering in an almost pained voice, "I can't…"

Demyx stood up, gathering with all the strength he could the rainwater in the waterspouts by either side of the steps, standing at Axel's side. He felt along the waterspouts with his mind, closing his eyes. Stopping the water in each, he waited…waited until the water was collected enough, pulling it in as fast as he could, then exploded the spray over the front yard, a great amount of the water dousing Axel. The energy that was surging within him seemed to die instantly, as if someone finally brought their lips to him and blew him out. The flames still crackled feebly, but they had calmed sufficiently.

"Roxas…" he uttered in a strangled whisper, crumbling down to the ground. Roxas ran to him, limping. He had gained about half of the bullet wound in Riku's knee, but that didn't stop him. He wiped away the sodden, red tresses from Axel's forehead, a sadistic smile on his lips. He had fainted.

"Get out…" Sora croaked angrily, burying his face in Riku's shoulder. Roxas looked back at him. "Take your monster and get out."


	7. Remake

Roxas quivered in the depths of the drawer, looking and listening through the small crack of airspace he had created for himself. The orange light of the fan above flickered on and off as the fan's blades swung past it, his blue planets glistening in the flickering ray of light.

His knee stung, but he kneeled on it all the same, caressing Axel's mane of red hair as the fires crackled around them, the rain dying as Demyx doused the fire with puddles of water.

He slowly crept out of the small drawer, pulling it open from inside. Only the whirring of the fan left. The screams of Reno had died out. His pleas and cries for mercy, gone. The small boy's sneakers met the carpeted floor, then the tile in the kitchen, the laundry room…

…the charred grass, the blackened stairs, the patio with the weeping Sora. The brunette shook his head, croaking Riku's name over and over. The silverette told him back in a strangled voice that he was fine. He was fine, Roxas had fixed him. The blonde rested his back on the wall, his knee bent, releasing the pain.

"Go away, _get out_…"

Flecks of red littered the patterns on the tiled floor, the open door of the dryer. Some was still fresh, still dripping. Roxas turned his head at the sound of the soft splat of the liquid on tile, looking up at the hanging ring from the compartment in the wall, the one that if you pulled it, the ironing board came swinging out. The blood…it was seeping through the crack…

"All the fire's out…" Demyx's voice was quiet and soft, sympathetic toward Sora and Riku. "I-I'm sorry all this happened…"

He looped his finger into the ring, pulling and bounding backward, toppling his small body over as the ironing board came down, missing him by inches.

"There's a van…" Riku managed to say, his eyes hardly visible beneath their lids, "There's an old van in our shed. If you take it, you can go up the road behind our house. It's not plotted on any maps or GPS, I made sure of that…Like my privacy, you know? You can take it. It's yours. _All_ of yours. You need it more than us."

Reno. It was Reno. His arm hung limply from the ironing board, swinging from the gravity, the board still vibrating from the bounce it took. His eyes were still open, cold and vacant, trails of dried, salty tears visible down his cheeks. Warm blood was trickling from his half-open mouth, his hair matted and sticking out in stranger-than-usual directions, as if he stuck his finger into an open socket…his fingers…

"R-Riku, you can't be…_serious_," Sora sobbed, "Th-they just destroyed our whole yard, almost burst our house into flames, they – "

"I trust them." Riku simply said, "If you could do things like that, Sora, you would do the same to protect yourself, wouldn't you?"

…his fingers, they were bleeding. The fingers on the limp hand, the limp arm hanging down…no fingernails? Was that how the tortured him? How they got him begging for mercy, _screaming_? …h-he didn't tell them, did he? _No…_Roxas thought to himself, _No, Reno would never tell. _

"Are you okay, Roxy?" Demyx asked, stooping down to the blonde, now sitting, hugging his good knee to his chest. He didn't realize that he was crying until he answered Demyx with a sob, nuzzling his knee. Axel…he looked so much like Axel…

Almost the instant a gloved hand came up from behind Roxas, muffling his squeak, and tackling him to the ground, Axel burst through the door, hollering and shouting. His touch singed their skin and clothes, but that same touch was warm – so gentle to Roxas's skin as he was hitched over the redhead's shoulder. He threw a few more swear words over his shoulder at all the agents, the smell of smoke traveling through the air at each word, when the world seemed to stop and he caught sight of his brother, a lifeless heap, on the ironing board.

"I-I'm sorry, Axel…" he cried into his knee. Demyx cocked his head to the side questioningly, "I-I…he told me to hide…don't…don't go away like he did. He looked…he looked…"

_He looked just like you…_

Demyx took Roxas into his arms, kissing him softly on the forehead. Roxas outstretched his own arms and wrapped them around the taller blonde, cuddling against his beating heart.

Zexion was bent over, his hand cradling his forehead. He massaged his temples carefully with his fingers once, then lifted his head and looked at his hand, feeling again.

"I have a numb spot."

Demyx spun around too look at him, confused. "You what?"

"I have a numb spot." Zexion repeated, touching his finger above his right eyebrow again and feeling nothing, "I can't feel anything here."

Demyx moved the mass of slate hair out of the way to get a better look, caressing his thumb over the spot. Zexion winced, whispering, "It feels weird."

"It's a little puffy…" Demyx said with a concerned look on his face, looking into his two, ice-cold eyes. The one below the numb spot was red where it should've been white. The sitar player frowned. "And your eye isn't looking too good either."

"Must be a hemorrhage."

All five of them jumped at the sudden appearance of a conscious Axel, standing just before the steps with his hands in his pockets. He raised an eyebrow, as if it was common to light a front yard on fire with your mind, fall unconscious, and wake up again, completely unfazed. "Yeah, it's gotta be a pinpoint hemorrhage or something. He should be all right."

Roxas would've said something, _anything _to touch a nerve of Axel's, but it didn't deem necessary. He seemed to understand that, giving Riku and Sora genuine apologetic looks. He didn't say sorry though – it was enough. He directed his attention to Zexion, asking, "You okay, Muffin?"

"Hardly…" the teen replied, supporting himself by holding onto Demyx's elbow, his knees wobbly. "We're heading up the road behind the house to get out of here."

"And who's taking us?"

"Riku's lending us his van –"

"I _told _you." Riku coughed, standing himself up as Sora fussed over him, "It's _yours._"

Axel gave him an incredulous look. "Serious?"

"Serious."

"Sure you aren't just…delirious from that injury there?"

"Look…" Riku started to explain, "They were trespassing. They had no right to dominate my front yard like that. You didn't either, for that matter –" Axel bit his lip guiltily under the teal glare "—but the fact of the matter is, you four need help. You guys aren't the problem – it's your…what you can do." He stopped himself from saying "powers".

"Once I let it out, I can't take it back in," Axel shrugged it off, "I'll find some way to pay off this damage somehow. Thanks for letting us stay."

"The house is insured. Don't mention it." Riku smiled in a lukewarm way, Sora pulling his arm over his shoulder and leading him inside.

"The van's in the shed," Sora called over his shoulder. He didn't seem too happy about Riku's acceptance, "…see you guys later."

__001__002__003__004__005__006__007__008__009__010__011__012__013__

Xigbar Crutch sat in his room – the one the Org had made up for him, Indian style, on the floor. Ginger Ale cans were crushed and strewn everywhere, newspapers were spread across the floor. Not a light was on in the room except for the living glow of the television screen, the volume brought up to barely a murmur as Xigbar tried to focus both his eye and his nonexistent on the colorful images.

He'd hardly been there two days and the room was a mess. He scarcely ever went into the room. In fact, it had been his first time actually spending his time in there, sitting naked and cross-legged in front of the humming television set. The cause of all the scattered newspapers must've been his sudden appearance only an hour ago. The Ginger Ale cans? That was his doing in that one hour.

His hair cascaded down his back, one curtain of tangled, black and gray mess. He didn't have to do it in such a long time. He didn't like the feeling. He didn't know he'd end up _naked_ – but that made sense. _He _was the one…_teleporting_, not his clothes. Or his eye patch. But of course, he didn't really need the thing – in a few moments time, he figured the lack of it would come of aid to him.

Where the eye had once been there was a gaping hole, fleshy and red-tinged. It would terrify any child into hiding, and any _old man _to just heighten his blood pressure. It was perfect. It was just what he needed.

He'd wait until nightfall, when he was certain the scientist was sleeping.

He sauntered over to his nightstand, where an assistant was told to set the files of Axel, Demyx, Zexion, and, most importantly, Roxas. He let his weathered hand fall over the portrait of the young boy as if it was a coveted piece of jewelry.

He had killed many before. After all, he was a hired assassin. His fascination in death seemed to decide that for him. It was that look…that _look_. The way the person's eyes seemed to glaze over, seeing something, _something _that made them finally give in to the release of death.

What did they see? What did they see that made them so peaceful, so accepting as to giving into leaving Earth and into that place, wherever it was? Oblivion? Heaven? _Hell_? Or was it life all over again? Xigbar sighed. He knew the only way to find out truly was to die himself, but that was quite the paradox. What could he do with that knowledge if he was dead?

One thing Xigbar never did was kill a child. Personally. He'd killed several children in groups, planting bombs on planes and so forth, but those were all remote and he never saw their faces the instant before they died.

Roxas, though…he had to be the exception.

Yes, he was fourteen years of age, but still a child nonetheless. A young adolescent, and a feisty one from what he heard – a real _fireball_. What would he do to the poor kid? His mission, as Vexen had relayed to him, would be watch as they experimented on the boy once he was in their custody, stand back as they try and find the power resting within him. So they had to squeeze that little freak power out of him, whatever it was that Mansex wanted from his little ray of light. Then, once all the juice had been squeezed and he was emptied, he'd be killed. He'd struggle, flail, then his eyes would gain that glossy glaze, tears would swim up and out of his eyes, and then…that _look_.

That look…it'd play so beautifully on his face...in those cobalt eyes.

__001__002__003__004__005__006__007__008__009__010__011__012__013__

"Where are we going, Demyx?"

The musician didn't take his eyes off the road as he drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. The sun was setting as they innocently traveled the middle of nowhere, a building only around every five miles or so. Demyx answered after a few strokes of thought.

"I was thinking…we could stay at Xaldin's."

Zexion turned his head around swiftly from the passenger seat. Xaldin meant Luxord, and Luxord was an…"old friend" of Demyx's, almost as Marluxia was to Zexion, but a lot more consensual.

"Are you serious, Demyx?" Zexion asked, his voice a little more high-pitched than usual, "What if Luxord takes control of you again? What if he does something to hurt –"

"It'll be okay, Zexy." Demyx reassured the slate-haired boy, "Xaldin's there. He has sense. He won't let Luxord do anything to me."

"Weren't…Luxord and Xaldin involved in Project 013 too?" Roxas asked, straining his memory deeply. Axel looked down at the boy tightly wrapped in his long arm. He himself hardly remembered the mention of the names of the two men.

"Yeah," Demyx nodded. "They were pretty…well, nutty. They both were here for their 'holiday' from their home out of the country and ended up getting involved in the whole Project, but not just for the money – they already had plenty of money. They did it for the _experience_."

"How do you know?" Zexion asked huffily, "You still keep in contact with him?"

"I haven't exactly had the time to talk to old friends, Zexy," Demyx whined, "and Luxord's really nice when he's sober. He's totally different and doesn't yell at me or anything."

"So…they ended up staying here?" Roxas intervened.

"They had to." Demyx answered, "They were actually pretty drunk when they agreed to the whole thing and didn't remember until afterward that they had to stay under The Org's thumb, meaning within this country, of course…"

"Ah…" Roxas nodded in understanding, "But…isn't it a bit unwise to go hiding out at their house? I mean, wouldn't the Org expect us to hide out at the place with someone of the same…_conditions_ I guess?"

"It's our only chance, Rox," Axel told him, "We're completely broke. Why didn't we ask Riku and Sora for money?"

"Oh, that's intelligent…" Zexion retorted rather sarcastically, "'Hi, you just picked us up from the road, figured out that we were fakes, and we just turned your front yard into a war zone.' Don't you think the van was enough?"

"Sorry," Axel laughed, obviously not apologetic whatsoever, "But it's kinda hard to do anything without money, Muffin, carless or not."

"I'll illusion the money, then, like I did before."

"_No_, you won't…" Axel growled, "You got a pinpoint hemorrhage after taking a whole bottle of Advil – and Advil helps get rid of the fall back of your illusions. Once that stuff wears off, I doubt you'll be able to _live_ trying to hold the image of a dollar again."

"I'm getting better." Zexion said in his defense, glaring through the rearview mirror, "If I practice enough, I can learn to deal with the pain –"

"It's not enough for you to deal with the pain _mentally_, Zexion," Axel's tone was grave, "It's not a matter of how tolerant you are. You're body just can't take it. There's a difference between being tough and handling a little bit of pain and being an idiot and being able to handle too _much _pain and dying in the process!"

Zexion didn't even open his mouth to retort. He silently stared out the window, defeated.

"We're going to Luxord's," he told him, "and I don't _care_ if you're worried that he's going to take your precious Demyx away. You saw what happened back there at Riku's. Who says I can't do it again?"

__001__002__003__004__005__006__007__008__009__010__011__012__013__

Yes! Finally, it was eleven o'clock. Surely the scientist was in his room, sleeping somewhat peacefully. Xigbar would have to think fast and bring his plan into action swiftly. He stood in the middle of his room, upright and still completely bare of all clothes. He closed his eyelids, focusing on his destination, _becoming_ that place, completely surrounded by it.

_Vexen's room…show me Vexen Webb's room. Bring me there_.

He felt that familiar tingling sensation run all over his body like insects, his skin going transparent once again, and then he felt the hook catch him by the head and he was forced though a vacuum, standing in a shadowy room, crouched right at the foot of Vexen Webb's bed. Perfect. The scientist hadn't moved a muscle. A heavy sleeper, huh?

He crawled off the bed, cat-like, and shuffled around in the drawers for a pair of gloves. He pulled on a pair of leather black ones before climbing on top of the man, pinning his arms down heavily with his knees. The poor man wore gloves to bed. Afraid he'd sleepwalk?

His emerald eyes plinked open and there was that keen eagle eye twinned with the gaping hole of darkness, more disgusting than the maw of a mouth. He nearly screamed, but his voice was muffled when Xigbar's two gloved hands plugged his face, one covering his mouth and the other holding his nose.

"Let me be completely clear with myself, old man…" Xigbar whispered close to his ear, his thick strands of black hair brushing against Vexen's exposed neck, "If you want to see another rising sun, I need you to do something for me. I'm going to say a name and you're going to give me a lesson – a lecture on it. You'll be my professor and I'll be your pupil. I'll listen to every word, drink it in, digest it, but you must tell me _everything _you know, suspect, understand, and what you've been told. Savvy?"

The man underneath him nodded vehemently, taking in a much-needed breath after Xigbar released him.

"You ready for that name?"

Vexen nodded again, his eyes shining.

Xigbar shrugged, but smiled all the same. "Roxas Hart."

And Vexen told him. He told him _everything_. How he and Xemnas alike suspected that a great power lay within him, how along with his power to gain someone's injury, he could also gain someone's ability, thus explaining why he had heightened his temperature while healing Axel.

"But Xemnas…" Xigbar interrupted the spluttering scientist calmly, "Why's he so interested in him?"

"H-he wants to use him. He wants to use him to heal Naminé."

"Heal Namine?" Xigbar asked, rather interested, "Of her blindness?"

"Yes, yes!" Vexen screeched, "H-he also wants, I suspect, to have him for his own! His own pet, his own…his own…"

"Sex toy?"

There was silence.

"It's only a suspicion," Vexen breathed, "But the man's obsessed with him, and I couldn't help but overhear a few conversations."

"He lives up to his title of 'Mansex', doesn't he?" Xigbar laughed, looking back at Vexen, "You won't tell anyone about this will you?"

There was a slight hesitation. "N-no of course not!"

His hands flew back to his mouth and nose, pinching hard on the bridge. He bent down low and snarled, "I don't believe you."

His arms struggled against Xigbar's knees, but to no avail. He kicked his legs soundlessly, pulling his head from left to right, straining his eyes, looking into Xigbar's one as if to ask for help, when they seemed to look completely past him, and then there it was…that look. That look of puzzlement, as if he had just seen a peculiarly shaped spot on the ceiling, but he was about to _die_. What could he possibly see that made him look that way? Xigbar inched closer, staring into the eyes that looked straight through him. It was still there momentarily, until he felt the heartbeat between his legs make its final beat. All expression was gone.

He sat there for ten more minutes, just to make sure. Not another beat, not another breath. Not another look in his eyes. He released his grasp on the face and bit the tip of his finger, pulling the leather glove off and gently pushing the eyelids down, getting off the lifeless doll.

So, he had a bit of competition. No…he'd make sure Roxas Hart was his.


	8. Regenerate

It was Thursday – Roxas was at school and Axel was at work. Demyx lay on the couch, his arm dangling off the side as he blankly watched the television screen, silent except for the low, electronic buzz it permitted. He looked at the clock warily. Two fifteen. Maybe he'd be lucky this time. Maybe he wouldn't be different. He straightened himself up once he heard the distant echoing of footsteps climbing up the apartment building's stairs. He was about to get an answer.

The door creaked open and a handsome man appeared, several piercings in his left ear. He had a small goatee and mustache, but he seemed far more clean-cut with them than without them. His sky-blue eyes sparkled under his head of platinum hair, but Demyx frowned slightly at the redness of them.

"'Ello, Love," he greeted before he went in to kiss the boy full on the lips. He tasted bitter, sour…the taste of alcohol. Demyx secretly wiped his mouth off vigorously as Luxord headed toward the kitchen. He hated that taste.

"Where's my beer?" the man asked before he even opened the refrigerator to look inside.

"Y-you took it with you," Demyx answered, hopeful, "Don't you remem—?"

"_I didn't take it with me_." It was a slur, his muscles tense as he developed a death grip on the handle.

"But I saw you take--!"

"_I didn't – take it – with me!_" Luxord repeated with more anger, slamming the door shut. Something shattered behind it. Something tumbled noisily down. Demyx whimpered quietly, refusing to tear his eyes off the screen to look at the man behind him. He could feel the anger in each footstep. He could smell the alcohol on his breath as he leaned over him. "You took it, didn't you?"

Demyx was shaking. He still refused to look at him, even as close as he –

"Look at me."

Demyx didn't. He sniveled.

"_Look at me!_"

Demyx squealed in pain as a fist collided with the back of his head. Rivers were streaming down his face as he fell to the floor from all the blows, crippled and weak…useless.

Axel had always told him that Luxord wasn't the one, but he never saw him before two – in the mornings. He always complained about the age difference, too. Yeah, like seven years was much better than three, even as much as Axel claimed that Roxas was "like a son to him". Yeah. Sure. But still…was it worth it?

He sighed and shook his head at these memories, turning off a narrow road up a steep mountain. He didn't have to worry about that anymore. It was over. He head Zexion now, the frail boy sleeping gently next to him. And Luxord had Xaldin. _He didn't have to worry anymore_…

__001__002__003__ - - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__010__011__012__013__

"Are you out of your fucking _mind_, Crutch?"

Xigbar lifted his head, fully dressed this time. He looked rather neat and proper – shaven and clean. It must've been the look of fake-genuine sorrow, shame, and guilt in his eye. He was still wearing the gloves he wore only a few hours ago, in the hours of darkness where he killed that worthless piece of shit. He caressed them clandestinely behind his back. "I-I'm sorry, Sir."

Xemnas stared down at him, orange eyes aflame against his wholly tanned skin, his shining mane of silver dancing in the lamplight as he paced with the heat of Lucifer. His energy suggested that he wasn't mourning Vexen Webb's loss whatsoever – more like scolding Xigbar for losing an important piece to his puzzle.

"We _need_ Webb," the ominous leader continued, "How else will we be controlling the pyrokinetic once we have him in custody?"

"I don't know, Sir." He honestly didn't.

"Smith was going to watch the aquakinetic, but I haven't heard from him since…whatever went down on Moore Street. Marluxia was going to watch the illusionist, but Larxene frantically reported in a while ago that he may have been injured. Vexen was to have Fox so he could control his temperature, and I was going to watch Roxas Hart."

Xigbar's eyes flashed. "There's a hole in the plan, Sir."

"There are several holes," Xemnas growled, "but I can't be so sure about that until I get some solid information. There hasn't been anything on the news about what has happened, so someone must be covering it up. Larxene sounded terrified – it must've been hard to do. Smith must be alive."

"_Lexaeus _Smith, Sir?"

"He's rich," Xemnas stated, sitting behind his desk, "and smart. He'd pay a good amount of money to newscasters to keep it quiet."

Xigbar nodded, understanding. "So if we assume that Lexaeus and Marluxia are fit enough to take up their initial jobs…"

"Then yes, we will have _a _hole." Xemnas scribbled a few notes to a pad in front of him, "and holes should be filled. Will you be doing the honors?"

Xigbar's hands twitched behind his back. He shifted one to scratch his cheek. "Actually, I have an idea on that matter."

Xemnas looked up, suspicious. He crossed his fingers and coaxed, "Go on." It was a challenge.

"I've decided that I can't accept my pay."

Xemnas raised his eyebrows, picking up his gold-trimmed pen and clicking it before answering, "If you want a higher payment, I can certainly arrange—"

"I don't want your money," Xigbar interrupted, his voice raised, "Money means nothing to me. I want to have supervision of Roxas Hart once he's taken into custody."

Xemnas didn't even breathe. He just stared, then smiled. "I can't allow you to do that."

"Roxas has a hidden power that even _he _is not aware of," Xigbar relayed calmly, "And from what I know, he's stubborn – tough. I'll be willing to gain his trust, get into his head. I can crack him for you, Superior. I can show him that power, encourage him to use it in experiments. I can do that, and you'll be raking in all the dough imaginable, and I'll ask for nothing more than to do my job of beckoning the boy forth."

The Superior unclicked the pen after a pause, leaning back in his chair. He was intrigued. He rubbed his chin at this idea, but still brimmed with questions to be asked. "The boy…will others be permitted to see him?"

"Of course," Xigbar responded, though he knew he'd do anything in his power to deny the Superior Mansex to see the boy. Said Superior eyed Xigbar suspiciously once more, as if catching a hint of his devious thoughts. Damn, he was good…

"Very well…" He shuffled a few papers and Xigbar could feel triumphant fireworks go off in his head, "but just to warn you, we'll be monitoring every session you have with the boy. There are cameras set up in every room of each containment cell."

The small smile died out on Xigbar Crutch's face and he felt a firework sputter and die out. _Dammit_…but maybe he could still…

"Sir?" he asked with a glimmer of hope. "What will we be doing with him once the experiments are over and done with?"

"Disposing of him, of course," Xemnas replied without looking up from his papers, "He'll be a serious danger to society once he discovers what he can do."

Xigbar couldn't control the feral, Cheshire cat grin that spread across his features. "Sounds good to me."

__001__002__003__ - - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__010__011__012__013__

"Lexaeus! _Lexaeus!_"

Marluxia stirred. There was a crick in his neck from the way his head was tipped to the side. He groaned, bringing his head back up straight and cracking the neck. Much better.

"C'mon, Lexaeus, where the hell are you?"

He squinted out the car window. Larxene was frenetically pacing back and forth, tangling her fingers in her stray strands of hair as she held a death grip on her shaking cell phone. Her teeth were bared.

"Signal, signal, signal…" she chanted, but she caught sight of the spying Marluxia, immediately closing the phone and squealing in…delight? She wrenched the door open and mashed her lips to his, the pink-haired man jumping back in surprise.

"How do you feel?" She asked, covering up her past action. Marluxia looked confused.

"I feel perfectly fine. What happened?"

Larxene sighed, standing up once again and flipping open her phone. "I'll explain later – or let your memory do that for me…hang on…"

She studied the empty bars displayed on her cell phone's screen, clenching the phone harder in her grasp. The colors swirled in an array of pixels. She stopped. There the signal was, as high as ever.

"Yes!" she cheered, quickly finding Lexaeus in the contacts and pressing send.

They were in an empty field, the morning sun dying the clouds in pink and orange, the grass a strange blue color. The wind rippled waves in said grass, whipping softly through the two beings' hair as Marluxia stood up and Lexaeus's strong voice answered, "…Larxene?"

"_Lexaeus!_" Larxene screeched happily, making Marluxia jump.

"Larxene, where are you? How did you contact me? I haven't gotten signal in this place at all until now."

Larxene grinned excitedly. "I zapped my phone. It must've affected yours as well, but oh my God, you actually answered! Where are you?"

Lexaeus took a while to answer. "A field. Somewhere around Moore Street."

"Well, I figured that much," the woman was growing exceedingly impatient, "How did you get there? You ran? What does the field look like?"

"Yes, I ran," Lexaeus was calm, cool, and collected. Marluxia shifted in his stance, his arms cross, " And it looks like a field, Larxene. Long, green grass, trees on the outskirts…"

"Is he sitting or standing?" Marluxia muttered.

"Are you sitting or standing?" Larxene repeated. Lexaeus snorted.

"I'm laying down."

"Sit up then!" Larxene screeched.

A large ball of brick-red was seen elevating from the whispering blades of grass, revolving to face the two standing a good twenty or so meters away from them. "Oh…I see you now."

Larxene closed her phone and called after the ascending man, "Lexaeus, you idiot!" She spun around to look at Marluxia, "Couldn't you feel him?" the man sniggered, "Why didn't you tell me!?"

"It's fun to watch people struggle."

__001__002__003__ - - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__010__011__012__013__

The van jostled against the road when Demyx hit the rocky trail of granite cleverly camouflaged against the pine trees. They drove up to the towering, castle-like house covered in sheet rock. The car doors thumped in sequence after Demyx called everyone awake and looked up to the lofty building worriedly. He spied a disappearing hint of untouched blonde in the window of the tallest tower.

The front door opened, revealing a man with a myriad of dreadlocks hiding a face of clear, indigo eyes. A British flag bandana was tied in the jungle, holding the black mess behind him in a somewhat neat fashion. He held a large, white bowl at his waist, stirring its contents half-heartedly with a wooden spoon.

"Who the hell are you lot?" His voice was gruff and slightly British, obviously damaged by some form of tobacco or the other.

"We're from Project 013…" Demyx began to explain quietly, his hands folded above his thighs. There was a flash in the man's eyes and he stopped stirring.

"We don't know anything about it." He started, a small hint of fear lingering in his voice as he tried to close the door, but someone stopped him.

"Now, now, Xaldin, he's one of _us_."

Demyx's heart did a weird flip-flop at the sound of the sober voice. He sounded so different and new when he was sober. Zexion huffed audibly next to him, lacing his cold fingers with his rough, warm ones. Luxord appeared next to the confused Xaldin, smiling warmly down at Demyx – only Demyx. No one else in the world. He laughed solidly through his nose, leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed.

"Come back for some more, Love?"

The musician shook his head quickly, blushing. Zexion squeezed his hand tighter, begging to be noticed, begging to be _feared_ by this older man…but to no avail. "We need a place to hide. Just for maybe a month, you know? We're on the run from The Org."

The man rubbed his goatee at this statement, finally noticing the shy Roxas in his faded checkerboard hoodie, the tall Axel looking unsurely up at him, and his eyes rested rather sharply on Zexion glaring directly at him. _Ahhh_…competition.

"I see, I see…" Luxord nodded, smiling at only Zexion this time. "Very well. Come right in, Loveys – we have _plenty _of room, obviously.

Once the four sets of feet stepped over the threshold, they saw that Luxord wasn't lying. In fact, "plenty of room" was a downright understatement at the extravagance the home portrayed. Chandeliers hung high in the ramparts, genuine candles flickering from them. The scent of chocolate and frying batter wafted up the spiraling stairs after them as Xaldin worked in the flickering light of the kitchen. Though the whole place was poorly lit, it made for a good, haunting effect as they reached the top of the oaken stairs, their heads swiveling around their shoulders. Axel whistled once Luxord motioned them toward a hallway of probably ten rooms.

"Who'd you kill to get a place like this?"

Luxord smiled jokingly at the redhead pulling Roxas into a room with cherry oak walls. "Oh, I have a good lot of bodies in the cellar."

Zexion coughed, leading Demyx determinedly past Luxord toward the farthest room from him when the man touched his arm and asked, "Don't you get headaches?"

He froze in his tracks, all time and space doing the same as him. His eyes widened. How did -- ? _Where _did -- ?

"This hair in your eyes all the time…" he pushed a leathery hand to his right cheek, tucking the slate hair behind his ear, "I'd get a headache from not being able to see anything."

Oh God. That touch, that soft touch that was warm, caressing, but still strong and sure. It made his heart stop, his breath hitch, his eyes water. He couldn't think straight. Was this what made Demyx love the man so much? Probably. Zexion swore he was totally in love with this man, this man that smelled of a fresh shower, freshly laundered clothes, just…_freshness_. And his eyes, they…what were they again? He looked up to check, but…where'd he go!?

"Luxord!" Demyx cried, trying to wrench his hand from the man's grasp as he was pulled into a room, the door slammed behind them, "What did you do to -- ?"

"I slowed him down for just a moment, Love," Luxord told the mulletted boy, his fingers hushing those pretty lips of his, "He'd be in the way. Besides, we never got to say our proper hellos."

Demyx looked at the man unsurely, feigning a small smile. "H-hell—" his words were muffled by mouth and tongue, his arms clenched and thrown against the wall. Dust particles in the spidery rays of sunlight danced out of the way to make room.

Luxord attacked that mouth – that sweet, sweet mouth. How he missed it…how he longed to explore it all over again, trailing his hand over the protesting, young man's stomach, traveling over it softly, making to pinch a nipple, but…what the fuck was this…_thing _in the way? It was as if…as if Demyx's nipple was perched on this _mound_. And it wasn't hard, either, it was…well, he squeezed it to find out and let out a cry of surprise, jumping backward out of the kiss, crying, "Holy _shit_, you have breasts!"

Demyx looked up at the man, wide-eyed and offended. His brow was furrowed and he picked up a hand and slapped the man straight across the face, the Brit's head turning violently toward the opened door where Zexion was standing, smiling sinisterly. Demyx groped at his chest, feeling nothing that Luxord had felt as he whined. Luxord noticed, looking from his hand to the young man's flat chest confusedly. Zexion smirked even wider, taking his boyfriend's hand from his chest, saying over his shoulder as he left, "Karma's a bitch, isn't it?"

Zexion really enjoyed his power sometimes.


	9. Recreation

"Axel?"

Demyx returned home, dropping his sitar on the ground with a clunk. Usually the television was on, turned up pretty loud on Cartoon Network with the redhead sprawled out on the couch, the quiet blonde splaying his legs out on the ground. There was no power to the television, no Axel, no Roxas, no note. Something…something was wrong.

He burst out the door, immediately finding Reno's door, hammering on it with a clenched fist. "Reno? _Reno!_" No answer. He tried wrenching the door open. It was locked. He kicked it.

"_Is anyone in there_?"

No answer. A few nosy neighbors poked their heads out of their doors to see what the problem was, but Demyx ignored them. He wrenched his phone out of his pocket, dialing Zexion. _Oh please, Zexy, please be okay…_

"Hello?"

"_Zexion_," Demyx's voice was somehow cool and collected, but slightly wavering from his heavily pounding chest, "do you know where Axel and Roxas are?"

A pause. "They're not at home?"

"No. And Reno's door is locked. And I…I…" he touched his hand beside the door, a black, sooty spot blasted into it. "There's soot on the wall. And I can smell smoke."

"Shit…" Zexion cursed under his breath, "Hold on, I"ll be right there – what the hell."

"What?"

"Two guys in suits just walked in."

Demyx's eyes widened. "Do they…are they from Project 013?"

"I don't know, should I ask?" Zexion grumbled sarcastically before he took the receiver away from his mouth, then back to it. "Demyx, I think you should come back over here."

"Why?"

"Just get over here and help m –"

Dead.

Demyx didn't think he could ever run so fast.

__001__002__003__ - - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__010__011__012__013__

"So…we're okay, right?"

Malachite eyes flashed onto the seemingly upside-down Roxas. He shifted those brilliant slits back up to the porch's ceiling, the hammock he lay in creaking under the small movement.

"We can never say for sure, can we?" Axel answered, scratching the side of his chin as a water bird cried and flew over the lake beyond them. Roxas watched its wings flap and felt a small pang of envy before Axel continued. "I wouldn't worry so much, kid. Sure, you can be careful about your actions, but I wouldn't lose a night of sleep over it."

Roxas chuckled as he looked over his lover's closed eyelids. "You're one to talk about losing sleep."

Axel's eyes plinked open, lingering for a fleeting moment in those blue planets before he brings the back of his hand over his cat eyes as if blocking the sun. "Don't drag my insomnia into this, Ro."

"How long have you had it?"

"How long have you known?"

"I, of all people, would know that those dark circles under your eyes aren't make up, Axel." Roxas carefully made his way onto the hammock, straddling Axel's hips. "You haven't had a stick of eyeliner in years."

The hammock creaked and swayed ominously under the added weight, but Axel didn't mind. An eyeless smirk. "Touché, kiddo. Touché."

Small hands met the spidery one over Axel's brilliant…_closed_ eyes. Roxas furrowed his brow as Axel's smile widened. "Look at me, Axel."

The devious fox opened one eye teasingly and Roxas huffed, shoving the redhead in the chest. _Creak, creak, creak._ "Both eyes, idiot."

Axel proceeded in teasing the feisty blonde by squinting so hard, his eyes were nearly closed. Roxas growled, crossing his arms and making to get off the bed of ropes, but long fingers caught him in the back and pulled him down, creak, creak, chest-to-chest, lips-to-lips with Axel's nearly overwhelming presence.

"I love messing with you, Roxy," Axel chuckled in his throat as Roxas looked down at him with smoky eyes, a lock of his golden hair pushed behind an ear. He grasped the redhead's collar and forced him up, creak, creak, and reconnected their lips, this time adding his shy tongue into the mix, meeting with the pyro's.

They hadn't kissed like that in a long time. They never had the time, never had the relaxation. Roxas wasn't thinking about that, though. He was enjoying as his emptiness was filled, that usual, lukewarm feeling he always felt overcoming his body from his working lips to every inch of his flesh. The hammock groaned under the gentle movements, but Roxas didn't care. Not until –

"Oi!"

The blonde squeaked, the mess of ropes flipping over and toppling the two of them onto the wooden porch with several dull thuds and conclusive swinging and creaking. Xaldin blinked. Roxas growled for Axel to get his elbow out of his side.

"Well sorry to disturb a…heart-warming moment between the two of you." Xaldin coughed, "But dinner's on the table."

Axel's elbow detached itself from Roxas's side and he extended a finger into the air. "We'll be there in a minute!"

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Xaldin was indeed a cook. Not the usual stereotype for large, burly men with dreadlocks, but a large, burly man with dreadlocks wearing an apron and bandana was definitely the picture of a cook of perfected skill. His performance at dinner proved that, dishing out plates of roasted chicken, potatoes, and steamed broccoli. Roxas wasn't that big a fan of meals as described, but he actually liked everything, even the broccoli. It might've been that he hadn't had real food in…he couldn't remember how long. Zexion inclined his head in thanks as Xaldin passed him the butter. He liked Xaldin.

"Pass the butter, Ducky." Luxord asked a seat over from Zexion, right beside Demyx. The teenager didn't move an inch, just glared. Demyx proceeded in grasping the dish of butter and placing it next to the Brit's plate. The clean-cut blonde smiled intimately at Demyx, causing Zexion to growl in his throat through the clinking of utensils.

Zexion liked Xaldin. He _hated_ Luxord.

There was a dull commotion at the long, wooden dining table, the only noises being the soft chewing of the congregated company and the high clinking of knives and forks on glass plates. It went on like that for at least five minutes before Luxord's voice broke the awkwardness. More like added to it.

"So…how long have you two been together?"

Zexion made an effort to watch the butter melt over his mashed potatoes, picking out the skins with the tip of his fork. Demyx choked down the bit of chicken he was chewing, pushing it down with some water. "Six years."

"Ah." Luxord nodded, thoughtfully chewing at his own meat. Swallow. "Ever do anything?"

Xaldin shot a warning glance over at him, but he ignored it. Zexion worked more furiously at stirring his white mass of potatoes.

"Um…" Demyx began, "We…we've been kinda running from the government and stuff…"

"So what, you're little boyfriend can't run and fuck at the same time?" Xaldin coughed and choked. Demyx turned an instant shade of beet red. "You and I used to do it while standing, do you remember that?"

Silence. No clinking. No chewing. Just silence. Everyone was looking at Demyx and Luxord. Everyone but Zexion. Those mashed potatoes were just so damn interesting.

"A-actually…" Demyx braved after a few painful stabs of stillness, "I'm the…I'm the one on top…usually…"

Axel snorted and Demyx felt his face get hotter. Zexion was shaking.

"Really, now?" Luxord laughed, "So the little ducky isn't all he's made up to be, is he?"

"Yes he –"

"Does he ever use handcuffs?"

Zexion froze.

"H-handcuffs?" Demyx asked.

"Yeah, like the fuzzy pink ones I used with you."

Xaldin spat out a cornucopia of broccoli and potatoes. "Oh God, not the ones you use with _me_?"

"I-I don't think we should be talking about this…" Demyx moaned, but Luxord ignored him.

"He seems like the type that would be into BDSM. Whips, chains, necrophilia…"

"Lux, that's sex with dead bodies." Xaldin pointed out gruffly.

"He's pale enough to be dead, isn't he?" he continued, sipping at his cup of tea, "Besides, I bet he can hardly move enough to be considered living…"

_Just ignore him, just ignore him, just ignore him…_

"You spiked your tea again, didn't you?" Xaldin inquired, but Luxord just laughed as if it was a funny joke. "Youuuu spiked your tea again."

"Ever try the reverse missionary?" Luxord plodded on. He jumped once Axel pounded on the table with a fist, his eyes alight.

"_Fuck _yes!" he exclaimed, "I _love _that position! Whenever Roxy and I get the chance, I make him do it. Hell, he was about to do it to me on the hammock. Ask him."

Roxas slowly sank lower and lower in his chair, his eyes hidden behind his hair, his face reddening. Luxord laughed, biting off the head of his broccoli.

"The child? Isn't he…what, nine? Ten?"

"I'm fourteen…" Roxas grumbled, pulling the hood of his jacket over his head.

"Ohoho…" Luxord wiggled his eyebrows over at Demyx, "Déjà vu, eh, Love?"

Demyx laughed nervously, searching for Zexion's hand or thigh or _something_ with his left hand. He found his knee and felt that it was trembling.

"So yeah, I'm into the whole sadomasochism thing," Axel continued loudly, "Rox loves to be bitten, scratched, erotically asphyxiated, physically teased, all the good stuff."

"Do tell." Xaldin grumbled irritably.

"Axel, knock it off…" Roxas growled, but the redhead paid no heed.

"He's also a serious exhibitionist, no I'm _pretty_ sure he's getting turned on by me telling you guys th – _ow_!"

He was silenced by a swift kick to the foot from Roxas, and Luxord took the opportunity to pick up immediately. "Demyx was the same way. We used to do it in the kitchen and on the dining room table with the windows open and everything."

"I'm – trying – to – _eat_." Zexion finally interrupted, looking up and scouring Luxord's smug smile with his deadly eyes.

"…Xaldin's also been one for dining room table and kitchen sex as well," Luxord grinned, "always being in the kitchen anyhow."

Zexion opened his mouth to say something, looked down at the table, closed his mouth and lifted his plate. "I'm done."

"Zexy!" Demyx's fingers slid from his knee as he scooted back and pushed the chair back in with his foot.

"I said I'm done."

"Blimey, you haven't even eaten a bit of your me -- !"

"C'mon, Zex." Axel intervened, "I talk about sex while we're eating all the time. It's not like you to lose your appetite over it."

"I didn't lose my appetite over _that_," Zexion called from the kitchen, dumping his plate in the garbage disposal. "I lost my appetite when I saw _him _at the table." He stomped up the spiral staircase and out of sight.

Demyx sputtered, looking down and swatting away Luxord's hand that steadily crept up his leg. He stood up, not bothering to push his chair back in or get his plate, going after his raging, _current_ boyfriend.


	10. Regrow

"Zexy!"

Demyx rushed up the stairs in dizzying circles until he heard hurrying footsteps intermingle with his own. He looked down the left hallway, then the right, and he saw Zexion turn around the corner. He ran toward him, following him onto the balcony. The birds were chirping. The way the wind moved the trees...it sounded like an ocean. They were looking above the autumn trees at that height.

"Zexy, I'm sorry..." Demyx pleaded. The illusionist's back stayed turned, his shoulders hunched as he grasped firmly onto the railing. The musician took both his hands and placed them on the smaller's shoulders, leaning in and kissing the back of his neck. He shuddered. "He was just trying to get to you, babe. You shouldn't let him."

A pale hand met the tanned one and Zexion looked down, shaking his head. "I'm sorry. It's just...I'm just worried."

"What are you worried about?"

"What am I worried about..." Zexion muttered, spinning around to look up into his lover's eyes. "We're running from a government agency, Demyx. There are four of us and hundreds of them. They outnumber us one hundred to one. We can't win, Dem. We can't keep running. We've been doing it for six years. I'm ready to just give up already."

"Don't say that, Zexy -- "

"And why not?" His eyes were fierce and his voice carried an extra sting. He wasn't yelling though. "What all can they do? They'll just poke and prod us. Better than chasing us around the country, isn't it? Six years, Demyx, _six years_. I'm tired of this. I want...I want to go home."

The younger boy ducked his head in shame, sounding like a child pleading for his mother. Demyx looked down at him, understanding his feelings completely. He wanted to go home, too. He wanted to go back to the days where he and Zexion would snuggle comfortably under a blanket on the couch, delivering each other secret, chaste kisses while Axel and Roxas slept in the bedroom. He wanted to go back to all those times he spent going to the beach, tumbling in waves as Zexion watched with a half-smile on his face from his towel on the beach. He missed nights like the one on the beach, on the towel, the waves silent, and his whispered moans for more...

Demyx put his hands to Zexion's chin, lifting it softly. The boy looked at him, confused, before Demyx leaned in and kissed him deeply on the lips.

"Awww, aren't you two cute?"

They quickly jumped apart, looking toward Axel at the forgotten open, sliding door. He leaned against it, his legs crossed, with Roxas by his side, his arms crossed to be symmetrical.

"What're you doing here?" Zexion half-snarled. Axel only smirked, walking onto the balcony with them, Roxas in tow.

"I figured this would be a cool place to make-out after dinner, but looks like the spot's already been taken."

"You liar..." Roxas sighed as Axel shrugged. "He just wanted to check up on you two." He leaned against the balcony's railing, playing with the tip of a leafy vine.

"What can I say? I like my pornography."

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"I feel them."

Larxene and Lexaeus stopped in their tracks, all turning to look at Marluxia, his fist thoughtfully attached to his chin.

"Huh?"

"I feel them..." he repeated, still calm and collected. "They're around here somewhere."

"Should we call someone?" Larxene asked, flipping her phone out of her pocket, but Marluxia shook his head.

"Not until we know _exactly_ where they are. I could probably grab them easily without seeing them at the moment, seeing how there are so many plants around here, but I don't want to take the chances..."

Larxene shivered as she looked above her. The trees were towering, and he could make them grow even taller...trap them in a cradle of leaves and branches. She imagined the trees just caving in on her, the brambles, the pointed, thin bits of branch, the scratchy leaves...

"They're this way..." Marluxia aired, "Somewhere higher than the trees. They must be in a tall mansion of some sort. Next to a lake."

"Gotcha..." Larxene whispered back. Lexaeus stayed silent, crouching below in the ocean of tangled bushes and trees and the distant cries of cicadas and birds. He followed them somewhat stealthily.

"We gotta take out the redhead first, right?" Larxene aired, "Or else this whole forest will end up in flames and we'll be done for..."

"Correct." Marluxia responded, stepping over a rotting log, "Though we have no means of 'taking him out' at such a lofty distance. We may need some assistance."

"From...?" Lexaeus asked, forcing his low voice not to carry.

"Xigbar." Marluxia simply stated. Larxene and Lexaeus exchanged puzzled looks before continuing over the log.

"That new guy?" Larxene snorted, "What can he do?"

"The Superior has ranked him second-in-command, you know." Larxene's eyes widened at this statement, "And I've heard he's gotten high ranks in stealth and accuracy when shooting. All we need is a tranquilizer gun taken here by him, held by him, aimed by him, and shot by him, straight into the Fox's jugular vein on his neck. The effects will be instantaneous."

Silence from Lexaeus. Then words. "...and the rest of them?"

Marluxia laughed quietly to himself. "Look around you."

They did. They were surrounded -- completely surrounded, by a lush forest of gold and brown, hardly able to see the sun permeating through the leaves in the canopy. In an instant, Marluxia could make all the trunks wider simultaneously, squishing you between them into a bloody pulp. She shivered at this second thought. The possibilities of death or capture by manipulating plants were endless.

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The whole gang got to talking again. They hadn't done that in a while. After all, they just met up after six years of separation. They pulled up some chairs from inside and sat in the sun, basking in the autumn weather. They talked about, well...the "good old days". They tried hard to ignore the more touchy subjects of narrow escapes and tight spots, though Axel found it entertaining to talk about sex every other topic and how he and Roxas managed. Roxas's laughs from the last topic often dwindled into deadly, burning silences as his face held a horrible, red fire.

"He's so uke, he can hardly _do _the reverse missionary!" Axel snorted, twirling a glass he got from the kitchen earlier, "Even _though_ he's still the 'receiver', he expects me to always do all the work, y'know? Well, sometimes I like to relax and lay back. It gets tiring after a while to do everything."

"Tell me about it," Demyx laughed, receiving a push on the shoulder from Zexion, whose face was also a light shade of pink.

An hour or two had passed and Xigbar arrived, parking his car far from the mansion, meeting the trio in the woods. They uttered their whispered disputes of gratitude, grabbing him and pointing up at the balcony. He nodded, smirking.

"I'll need to climb this tree to get an easy shot though..." he told them, grabbing hold of the lowest branch and preparing to swing upward, "So --"

"I'll help." Marluxia grinned, a higher branch creaking as silently as possible down so Xigbar could swing onto it effortlessly. He looked over his shoulder at the pink-haired fruit and gave him his usual sharp-toothed grin before hoisting himself upward.

"Ohhh, Zexy..." Demyx laughed, "Remember that one time in the park?"

Zexion's face instantly became the color of Axel's hair. He pushed Demyx on the shoulder with both hands this time, muttering, "Shut up..."

"What happened?" Roxas chuckled behind a fist.

"It was the first time we ever kissed," Demyx grinned as Zexion pawed at him to stop continuously, "He went in to _try _and kiss me, but he missed."

Axel and Roxas burst out in raucous laughter. "He _missed_?" Axel hollered, "How the hell did he m -- !?"

All eyes turned to Axel urgently. The red end of a dart jutted from his neck as his eyes fluttered and he fell backward in his chair, falling in a clatter to the floor. Zexion stood up immediately. "_Sh--!_"

"_Zexy_!"

Zexion's voice was muffled by a tangle of leaves pushed against his lips. Vines wrapped around his wrists and pulled him over the ledge backwards with muffled cries. Demyx cried out hoarsely for him, making as if to dive after his body, but a thick branch hit him over the head, having him hang limp over the edge. "Demyx!" Roxas cried out, running to his side.

The trees twisted and churned, but stopped after a voice growled, "_Stop it!_ This one's for me!"

Roxas gasped when he heard feet land on the balcony behind him. He didn't dare turn around as they came closer..._clack...clack...clack..._He heard the leather in the his pants moan and stretch as he crouched down, a thick-skinned hand gently meeting the base of his neck, and a needle plunging itself into his vein.

Lips against his ear. Then teeth.

"_You're mine, kid_."

"Let _go _of me!" Zexion cried once the sour leaves escaped his mouth. Marluxia had caught him, caressing his hair and telling him to hush.

"Shhh, my Nightingale, this will all be over soon."

"My _ass_."

"I rather like your ass." The pinkette smirked.

"Shut up."

"No, you."

Zexion went to gasp, but couldn't. Marluxia's thumb was pressing down on his trachea firmly. He choked and swallowed to attempt at breathing, his mind started ringing, his vision started going black. He made a lame attempt at trying to disillusion Marluxia with some image or another, but failed. All Marluxia saw was a small puff of smoke which went by unnoticed. He finally stopped struggling and Marluxia slung him over his back.

"_Incoming!_"

Lexaeus looked up just in time to catch the unconscious Demyx in his arms. A small trail of blood trickled somewhere near his temple. Lexaeus frowned deeply at this sight, brushing the boy's hair away to give him better access to the air around him.

_Thwump_. Xigbar's boots met the forest floor as the remaining of the autumn leaves of orange, yellow, and brown, showered down on them. He carried Roxas in his strong arms and Axel, miraculously, on his back. The both of them slept soundlessly.

"Did you take care of the witnesses?" he asked in a raspy voice to Larxene.

She smiled as they headed past the open front door, Luxord and Xaldin's bodies laying on the floor, their eyes dead and staring out toward nothing.


	11. Reawaken

Three years had gone by since Axel careened down the apartment building's steps, wheeling around each corner as tranquilizers were shot after them, chipping and rebounding off the walls. Three years, and they were still running.

It was Roxas's eleventh birthday that day, so Axel thought it best to celebrate somehow by stopping at some place half-way decent -- a Christian Homeless Shelter. Axel said they were brothers. Roxas could hardly believe they bought it. Nothing about the two individuals was alike. The one thing they shared was a deep bond a blind man could see in the dark.

Axel told the pastor, the leader of the place, not to let any suits in as long as the two were there. Miraculously, the pastor obliged with no questioning at the given time, leading the two down a dusty, gray hall and into a room with naught but a lamp glowing forlornly beige on the floor and a bleak, half-sized bed against the wall.

A _bed_.

Roxas almost forgot they existed in such a malevolent world. Lately he had been sleeping curled up on Axel's lap in an alleyway or dark corner, shivering from the cold. A few times they had to huddle up in a dumpster, but Axel only announced that unfortunate sleeping quarters as an absolute last resort. Showers were scarce -- showers meaning rain.

Both Roxas and Axel thought they would pass out when they heard the place had running water, _and _an actual shower. The water ran cold, and it turned off after six minutes, but Roxas could feel tears of joy dripping from his eyes when he found a small wedge of soap in the corner of the wet, tiled area.

Best. Birthday. Ever.

"Happy Birthday, kid."

Roxas smiled, a small hint of pink climbing up his cheeks as he directed his eyes downward, zipping up his weathered, checkerboard jacket. Axel had already showered, his lanky limbs spread out on the bed, his arm draped over his propped up knee. "I talked to the leader of the place again. He said he'd happily wash our clothes for us."

An extra coat of gloss appeared in Roxas's eyes as he looked down at the faded black and the yellowed white checkers. He threw himself into Axel's arms, the pyro smiling and tracing lines in the boy's spine. He kissed him tenderly on the forehead after brushing his curly bangs out of the way.

"But we don't have an extra set of clothes." Roxas pointed out. Axel smirked at those sparkling blue eyes once the boy resurfaced from the hug.

"I know."

He kissed him softly on the lips, dragging his fingers through the blonde curls as the sapphire orbs slowly narrowed into slits.

Roxas may have only been eleven, but he had wisdom that far surpassed his years and appearance. He had to, having been on the run from the government for three years. Roxas didn't like it, but he appreciated all the sense it knocked into him, although forcefully.

Therefore, he knew Axel was trying to get into his pants and steal his perfect virginity.

When the kitten gave his clothes up, he immediately found refuge under the bed sheets. Axel laughed raucously.

"It's your birthday, isn't it? Wear your birthday suit with pride."

"Pedophile." Roxas didn't even look at him. Axel merely grinned, watching the little cat hold the gray sheets up to his mouth, staring purposefully at a dull spot on the wall.

"You know, we're gonna have to share the bed eventually."

Roxas turned to look at him, sitting on the floor with no modesty or shame whatsoever. You would've thought Adam never ate the Forbidden Fruit. The boy snapped his widened eyes shut to prevent himself from looking there again. He could almost hear Axel's smile. "You can get in when we get our clothes back. Pervert."

"Aww, but the pastor said they don't have a dryer, so it'll take the clothes forever to dry on the clothesline."

"You can sleep on the floor for all I care." Roxas spun around, facing the wall, but still keeping his eyes shut. He squealed when the bed sheets were tugged at, tensing his body and eyelids closed even tighter as warm skin touched his quivering, nervous body. Axel lay directly behind the blonde, wrapping his fingers around the small, tender waist, kissing the nook between his hunched shoulder and neck. Every fiber of Roxas's being seemed to scream "PUSH HIM OFF. PUSH HIM OFF!"

"You're poking me," was all he could say.

"Am I?" Axel asked, even though he already knew the answer. Roxas couldn't help but smile.

"I'm going to kill you when I get my clothes back."

He could feel those lips tighten into a similar smile against his shoulder. "Good. Now hurry up and spread your legs."

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"Can you tell me what this card is?"

"A circle!"

Naminé Rose sat in her petite, plastic chair, her legs tightly closed together, her sandaled toes hardly touching the ground. Her eyes, pupils lost in a misty, blue fog, stared whimsically past the woman sitting three feet in front of her, Aerith Gainsborough.

The woman was proper, but still incredibly beautiful and perfect. Her hair hung in a large plait down her back and she had ringlets framing either side of her face. Her eyes were a dark, forest green behind frame-less glasses. She looked down at the flash card facing her and nodded at the circle on its face. "Very good. You really are psychic, aren't you?"

"I can tell you the rest of them," Naminé spoke in a quiet voice, "but I'm not supposed to. Mommy will get mad."

Aerith switched the cards over to a triangle and snuck a glance over it at the mysteriously beautiful blonde. "Why will she get mad?"

"She thinks it'll scare you if I tell you," she wringed her hands, but didn't look down, "She's coming here right now."

"Is she?" Aerith looked around at the white door behind them, and then looked back at her cards, "What's this one?"

"Tri--!"

"_Xemnas!_"

Aerith jumped, her shoulders hunched as she turned around to observe the intruder, Larxene. The sharp woman held an expression of pure questioning as her grip loosened on the doorknob. Her heels clicked and echoed as she crossed her arms, scrutinizing this woman with her own electric-green eyes. "Who's this?"

"Oh, I-I'm Naminé's psychologist, Aerith Gainsborough..." she hurriedly uncrossed her legs, pushed a stray bang behind her ear, and stood up, holding out a manicured hand. "You must be her mother."

Larxene merely looked at the hand in seeming contempt as she walked by. Aerith frowned, withdrawing her hand, as the stilettos scaled the room. _Clack. Clack. _"Where's Xemnas, Naminé?"

"I'll tell you when Aerith leaves and I get to talk to you."

There was a strict silence as Larxene glared at the blind girl, then swung her attention to the anxious psychologist. The woman started as she mouthed "sorry" and turned quickly around, closing the door behind her as quietly as she could.

"Mommy's really busy, Namine," the woman shrilly groaned without eye contact, drumming her painted fingertips on her elbow, "make this quick."

"I wanted to say congratulations because you caught all of them, didn't you?" The girl's voice swirled through the air like fog, mystifying and somehow calming Larxene's tense attitude, "Since you did, you'll get a small present in the future, though lose something as well."

Larxene sighed obviously and angrily, "What present? And what will I lose?"

"I can only tell you a little. If I tell you more, things will mess up."

"Alright, Little Miss Fortune Cookie," Larxene growled sardonically, yet somewhat playfully as she sat down and crossed her legs, "What's this month's prediction?"

"I learned something from someone's mind today," Naminé began. Larxene rolled her eyes as if anyone could "learn from someone's mind", "One of the people you brought here today. He was sleeping, but I found it."

"What is it?"

"The human brain has electrical pulses."

The callous vixen's fingers stopped drumming, her lipsticked lips pursing slightly. She turned her widened eyes on her daughter. "Only his?"

"No," Naminé's blonde locks waved in front of her eyes as she shook her head, "Everyone's. But people like us have bigger ones."

Larxene studied her outstretched fingers scrupulously, remembering all the times she touched appliances and felt every cog and gear as if she was the fluid body of electric energy running through it. Could that mean...?

"...I can read minds?"

Naminé blinked for the first time in a while. "Don't do it. You might hurt someone. Besides, you just feel with the electricity -- like Daddy feels with plants."

Larxene moaned at the mention of her husband.

"If you held someone's brain in your hands and squished it all up, would you be able to read their thoughts?" Naminé demonstrated slaughtering gray matter into a mushy pulp with her dainty hands as she explained this. Larxene looked up from the somehow disgustingly hypnotic display once she had finished speaking.

"...but I can basically...turn their brain to scrambled eggs?"

The young girl's eyebrows upturned. "Maybe. That's why you shouldn't do it."

"Then why did you tell me I _could_?"

Namine bowed her head, scrunching her toes. "I don't know. I just know that I had to."

"I don't have time for this..." the deadly heels hit the tile floor in unison, echoing violently as the woman wearing them hurried toward the door. "I'm leaving now."

Naminé nodded, her head stilled bowed. Larxene took her hand off the doorknob and walked more slowly over to her daughter, her arm swinging lamely at her side in time with her steps. She pressed her lips to the top of the girl's silky head, petting the spot once before she made it softly to the door.

The clench in the little girl's fists loosened. _That's why...that's how I know she's still my mommy._

"He's in the observation room," Naminé told her, still not looking up, "Xemnas is in there. He's watching Roxas dream."

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Roxas bit down hard on his knuckles to prevent himself from screaming in pleasure as loud as he wanted to as sweat ran down his neck, the small bed creaked, and that same, luscious spot was found and hit again and again. His calves were wrapped around that tight, hot waist, his screams deafening even when stuffed with his throbbing knuckles.

There was one last moan that ricocheted off the walls, Roxas praying that no one heard him as Axel pulled out, hot, thick liquid leaking out with him. They both panted heavily, side-by-side. Roxas held his wrist. He could've sworn that some of the liquid that leaked out was his own blood.

"We have to tell someone about this someday."

Roxas looked up at Axel in mid-cuddle. "…about how you took an eleven-year-old boy's virginity in a Christian shelter?"

"Well _yeah_, but that's not what I meant."

The kitten nuzzled weakly against the fox's chest before asking, "What did you mean?"

"I meant how all this shit happened," Axel answered immediately, "With The Org. How they fucked us up and made us part of this huge experiment that we didn't even sign up for."

"But we _did _sign up for the experime—"

"I signed up for getting injected with a _hallucinogen_," Axel interrupted, unconsciously petting small circles in Roxas's shoulder blades, "for a drug trip. A harmless, little drug trip. Those fires are sure as hell _not _hallucinations. And all I really wanted was the money."

Roxas nodded wearily. "They lied to us."

"People would help us if we got our story in the paper…" Axel thought aloud, "Sure, only Star Trek fags would believe us, but at least we'd get our story out…Maybe in some big paper – like _The Times_."

"_No one _would believe us…" Roxas groaned, feeling a chaste kiss on his forehead.

"Still, someday the world has to see just how screwed up the government is, you know?"

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Roxas gripped at the sheets, feeling a searing pain in the back of his hand. His eyes blinked open and he saw his knuckles, freshly bleeding. He commenced licking at the metallically-flavored liquid, his senses and thoughts steadily coming back through his toes, his calves, his th –

Oh God. Wet dream. Very wet dream.

…_where the hell is Axel_?

He pushed his sheets off and froze. _Sheets_? Clean, white, and glorious _sheets_? And a bed? Did he go back in time or something?

He looked down at his clothing. He never wore anything like them in his life. They were almost like scrubs – a white shirt, white shorts…what happened? Was he still dreaming?

_You're mine, kid._

The words echoed like a phantom in his mind. He blinked. He remembered talking to Axel, Zexion, and Demyx on the balcony, then something weird and red was sticking out of Axel's neck, he sounded like he was choking, he fell, the trees creaked, leaves were falling everywhere, then –

He clapped a hand to the spot on his neck, running his fingertips over the small bump on the pulse. He looked down at the white bed sheets, around at the white walls, the bookcase, the white _books_. It looked like…like a mental ward. He had to still be dreaming, but dreams have to have an…extra pair of clothes, right?

He padded across the floor, finding a white door that blended in with the wall flawlessly. He found the doorknob and turned, starting at the sight on the other side.

It was a man sweeping the kitchen floor. Roxas wasn't sure whether or not he himself was intruding or the man sweeping the floor in front of him was. He just stared for a moment, drinking in his needle-in-a-haystack appearance.

His hair was black and long with tresses of white through it, held in a tight ponytail that swayed with every little movement he made. He was wearing a janitor's uniform, his keys jingling, but what intrigued Roxas the most was the eye patch he bore over his right eye, adjacent to a jagged scar up his left cheek.

He stopped sweeping and looked up, eyebrows rising over his asymmetrical eyes. He sighed, clipped his broom on his black cart, and wheeled it toward the door Roxas figured led outside.

"_Wait_!"

Xigbar Crutch looked over his shoulder at the boy indifferently on the outside, screaming in delight inside.

"Where am I?" Roxas asked.

"Welcome to The Room That Never Was," he told him in a whisper. Roxas raised an eyebrow at him. "Pff. Just pulling your leg."

"Then where am I?" Roxas was stern, glaring at the man.

"Look, kid, it's not my place to tell you," he shook his head, "That's all up to the Sexman. You'll hear from him soon enough, I'm sure." He checked the watch on his wrist and started, sliding a card through the slider next to the door, the door making a _ding _noise and sliding open, "Sorry. Gotta run."

Roxas blinked again, baffled at the outside world. People were bustling in the halls, speaking animatedly yet importantly. Their clothes…they weren't white. Neither was the janitor's, but still…

The door closed behind him and there was silence once again. Roxas thought he could hear a faint ringing.

"Have a nice rest, Mr. Hart?"

Roxas jumped. The voice was obviously on a PA system, echoing through the small, apartment-like room. His eyes searched wildly around for a face or speakers.

"I asked you a question," the drawling, menacing, _terrifying_ voice came back. Roxas sealed his lips, motioning a key locking his mouth tight and throwing away the key.

"Adorable," the voice laughed darkly, "Welcome to your new home, Mr. Hart. If you need a recollection, you have been captured by my men – the people of The Org. You and all of your companions have been put into separate cells. You will all be taken to our facilities accordingly for check-ups, blood tests, CAT scans, and several other medical procedures. Following and intermingling with that schedule, we'll also be testing the extent of your abilities. We've heard you can heal people."

A light clicked on somewhere in Roxas's previously fuzzy mind.

"What are you talking about?" he looked genuinely puzzled, turning around the room, getting dizzy. He didn't know where to look. "I can't…_heal_ people."

"Hm," the Superior didn't sound impressed at all, "You aren't the best at lying, are you?"

Roxas scowled at a corner at the top of the popcorn ceiling. "You won't have any proof. You can't go off of just what people say."

There was a pause. "There are ways to get what I want out of you, Roxas."

The static of the PA system died out and Roxas knew he wouldn't be hearing from this…"Sexman" in a while, but he knew he was still being watched. Constantly surveyed. Every movement, every room…even when he was having that dream…

…he shivered at the thought.

…_Axel. Axel…they caught us. Oh my God, they finally caught us._

_It's…it's over._


	12. Restrain

"Xemnas!" Larxene burst into the dark observation room, Xemnas's tanned visage facing down on the screen opening up to Roxas's world. He didn't bat an eyelid.

"What is it you want, Rose?"

The woman crossed her arms and scrunched her face up, loathing the sound of her last name. "Don't I get a reward for finding the brats?"

Xemnas smiled, laughing in his throat as if it was a funny joke. He didn't take his eyes of the screen. "You didn't find them -- the other Rose felt them and Crutch carried the Healer and the Pyrokinetic, Smith carried the Aquakinetic, and the other Rose carried the Illusionist. What, I must ask, did _you _do?"

He finally revolved his glow-in-the-dark eyes to her without turning his head. His tone of voice and mere presence seemed to hold a venomous undertone of misogyny. Larxene's lips were parched. "I...destroyed the witnesses."

"The _witnesses,_" his head was fully turned toward her, the left half illuminated by the flickering screen, "Which were, coincidentally, two other members of Project 013 -- two other people being watched by us. Luxord Cartwright had the ability to slow people or certain objects in time, or speed up the process. Xaldin was Aerokinetic -- _he could control wind._"

"But Sir," Larxene tried her best to match Xemnas's challenging tone with her vicious look of stone, "I was informed that those two were unwanted because their powers had been diluted by drugs and alcohol!"

"_Saïx was just the same!_" Larxene nearly fell over from the booming voice. Her eyes were wide and showed fear for the first time in her encounter with the Superior. "Saïx hardly had any power, but he was still of use to us! You're _not _getting a raise or promotion, Mrs. Rose. You don't deserve either, nor will you _ever_. _Good day._"

He sat back down. His "_good day_" finalized the argument, leaving the woman shocked and rigid and leaving the room, opening the door to Xigbar pushing his cart, and huffing as she stormed past him. He flinched when the door slammed shut.

"Yeesh..." Xigbar crooned, "What bug crawled up _her_ ass?"

Xemnas disregarded the question, considering it rhetorical as he tapped on Roxas's image who had been currently using the restroom. "I thought you were to be the boy's supervisor? I thought you were going to 'crack' him? I don't see any progress being made."

Xigbar shook his head, propping his mop up precisely in its bucket, shaking his head and tutting. "You heads of big, old, government organizations all have the same views, don't you?" The orange eyes did a challenging eclipse, his finger ceasing its tapping. "All you can see in big flashing lights is R-E-S-U-L-T-S." The eye-patched one dropped his arms to his sides from forming the word in the air, "and that's _all _you see when trying to get the money from the safe. All you can see is the stupid..._money_."

"Get to the point, Crutch." Xemnas tried in his attempt to sound more authoritative, but he already knew who was holding the baton in this confrontation.

"Think of the little kitten," he tapped Roxas's dim-gray head of hair on the black and white screen as he escaped from the bathroom and back into his bedroom, "_he's _the safe. Now what you want -- for him to use his powers by our will during experiments -- is the _money_, and, of course, the actual money you'll be raking in with the proof of the boy's existence and power.

"Now what you're suggesting I do is get to the 'money' as fast and as soon as I possibly can. What would that strategy be, would you say?"

"To tell him to use his power or you'll strangle him to death." Xemnas suggested gruffly.

"In other words, blow up the safe to get to the money?"

Xemnas's eyes flashed angrily and impatiently as he looked down at the boy. He nodded.

"Ah...but what would _happen_ to the money?"

Xemnas blinked. Xigbar made a hissing noise, holding his fists together, then opening them up, imitating an explosion.

"You can't rush such meticulous responsibilities, Superior," he explained, placing his hands on his hips, "or else, Roxas will catch on. He'll make up extra-tight security, _so _tight that he will be impenetrable. That's why I'm here, carefully listening on the outside as I turn the dial, easing my way closer to the code."

Xemnas laughed jokingly, slightly flustered as he shook his head. "You really are the one for metaphors, Crutch."

"I am." Xigbar grinned toothily, the expression fading as he watched Roxas laying on the bed, staring at the hidden camera in the center of the ceiling. His lips were moving mechanically.

"What's he saying?" Xigbar whispered, squinting closer to the static screen, trying to read those small lips. Xemnas put two fingers to the sound slider, pushing it up. They could then hear what he was mumbling, so much quieter than a whisper.

"._..xel...Axel...Axel..."_

He did it over and over again, his voice getting shakier as he went on, eventually breaking into whimpers and squeaks as he curled up onto his side. Xigbar grinned victoriously.

"That other kid...Fox, right?"

"I'm watching him," Xemnas growled possessively.

"Yeahhh..." Xigbar saw the fireworks so brilliantly, he thought he could see the blue in Roxas's eyes fill up his with Death's sweet song, "I've found the first number to my combination."

__001__002__ - - - __ - - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__ - - - __011__012__013__

Axel stood in front of the open refrigerator door, blinking at the lack of edible food. There was a pack of lettuce, some shredded cheese, and everything else you could put in a salad. He huffed as he reached for a small box of raisins, closing the door behind him with his leg.

So that guy, Xemnas...he said they were captured. Great. He knew it'd happen eventually. Roxas just constantly had the attitude that if they did the right things, they'd eventually give up, drop all their weapons and go, and he was starting to believe him, but...they already showed them a glimpse of Hell, exploding cars, building fiery walls, destroying minds, and dehydrating bodies. What _were _the right things? The Org members still persisted, even after catching a glimpse of their horrific powers.

He flopped down backwards on his springy bed, chewing on the shriveled grapes. All in separate rooms, all with separate supervisors...but Axel knew they wanted Roxas the most.

_Roxas..._

_Fuck this shit._ He bounded up from the bed, the green irises and black pupils completely void of his eyes. He felt the fiery energy pulse through his boiling blood as he stared at the white wall intensely, concentrating, but the wall didn't even so much as warp. The paint didn't even crack or melt or char. _Come on, concentrate harder..._

Nothing, nothing, _nothing!_ The color in the pyro's eyes returned as he cried out angrily, pounding the spot with his fist and instantly rebounding, sucking at his knuckles. The wall wasn't even _warm_.

Panicking, he snapped his fingers. No flame, no spark, not even a hint of _smoke_. He snapped again and again in rapid succession, each hand overlapping, then simultaneously. The temperature didn't waver.

He cried out in frustration, cradling his head as he brought it back down from his defeated howl. They did something to him -- something to control his power. A diet, a drug, _something _was holding back that fire. He could feel it still writhing and clawing inside him, begging to struggle out and just _breath_, be free, cause that same chaos and bedlam as before so all this would just break away and _diminish..._

"Even if the drugs weren't holding in your power," Axel started and looked up at a shiny mass entering the room, the sliding door closing behind it, "everything in this room is fireproof. You're not burning yourself out, Fox."

Axel rose one eyebrow. It was the same man from before, but in person, in some suit that seemed fit for Mars, square and ridiculous at the head. There was a glass case in front of his tanned face of orange eyes. He smiled at Axel who recoiled in response.

"Dressed for the sci-fi convention, Trekkie?" Oh. God. The drugs had to be affecting his comebacks as well. Jesus Christ.

"Funny." Xemnas was not amused. He grasped Axel by the shoulder, shoving him against the wall. He was taller than the younger man, and however menacing his jack-o-lantern eyes were, Axel wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of fear in his own malachite eyes. His glare didn't shift.

The superior produced a needle, sticking the cold syringe into the side of the pale neck fluidly. Axel wanted to grit his teeth when he felt his blood squeeze into the small capsule, but he deepened his glare instead.

"Tough one..." Xemnas laughed quietly through the speaker in his suit. Axel reduced his eyes to even narrower slits. He knew these kinds of people. What they wanted was a struggle -- screaming, grunting, shouting, pitiful pleas of mercy...he wasn't going to give him that. Not in a million years.

The taller man shoved him against the wall one last time before pocketing the sample and departing. Axel scowled after him, rubbing his neck. He didn't like this guy.

_You'd better stay away from Roxas..._


	13. Relate

The door to the third cell slid opened and Demyx turned his head to the sound from his sprawled out position on the couch. The man who came in was tall enough to have to duck slightly when entering, his brick-red hair tickling the door frame.

_"Demyx! __**Demyx**__, wake up!"_

_"Marluxia, shut him up!"_

The voices echoed in his mind as he squinted at the man. Where did he...?

_"Demyx, please wake up! Please wake __**up**__! I love you! __**I love you**__!"_

_"Jesus __**Christ**__, make him shut up!"_

_"I gave him a sedative. He __**won't **__shut up!"_

_"Demyx!"_

_"Zexy..."_

_His eyes opened only enough to see the man above him, wiping his brow with a cool rag. His expression looked anxious._

And it did then as he walked toward him on the couch.

"It's Demyx, right?"

His voice was deep, but somehow incredibly careful and gentle. His stance was one that suggested he was inching toward a rabbit he was afraid might bite him. Demyx slowly sat himself up, watching him warily the entire time. He nodded, biting his lip a bit in uncertainty.

"I'm...your supervisor during your stay here in The Org laboratories," he began, folding his arms behind his back and pushing his square chin up high, "I'll be informing you when you'll be sent to the testing facilities and escort you accordingly."

Demyx stared for a bit, his head cocked to the side as he looked the hulking man up and down. He clenched his arms tighter behind his back under the younger and smaller boy's stare.

(please don't bite me please don't bite me)

Snort. Then Demyx broke out into fits of laughter. So that was it, huh? It sounded as if the man was announcing his stay at a luxury hotel, and he just got the job. He said it so quickly and nervously in contrast to his slow and menacing physique that Demyx couldn't help but howl and laugh to the point of tears. Lexaeus upturned his eyebrows at the buffoonery. He checked if there was something on his face that must've caused this outbreak.

"I-I'm sorry..." the younger man finally managed to surface from beneath his turbulently trembling lungs, "I guess...I guess it's just too much."

"Too much?" Lexaeus asked, genuinely curious. Demyx made room for him on the couch by sitting up, crossing his legs indian-style. The taller one sat down, making sure to keep a person's distance between them. It was hard due to his size.

"That we've been captured..." Demyx answered in a hushed tone, "That we've finally been captured."

There was a strong silence between them as Lexaeus held his elbows, his shoulders hunched, shifted his legs, fabric against fabric.

"It just seems like all those years of running have gone to waste." Demyx continued, nonchalantly scratching the back of his head, "but, I mean, what can you do? You guys weren't just gonna give up and go home. Too much money's been put into this. You didn't give up even after..." his eyes narrowed as if he found an incredibly interesting stain on the floor, "even after..."

"The Fire?"

Demyx gasped, "You were there?"

Lexaeus hesitated, his mouth slightly open, but nodded slowly all the same.

"Gosh..." Demyx mused, turning away and looking determinedly at the stain again, "If _that _didn't slow you guys down, what will?"

The man shrugged his shoulders, shook his head. _Please don't get any ideas._

"When's my first appointment?"

Lexaeus raised his eyebrows. He couldn't believe how relaxed this boy was over something so major -- six whole years spent just to get caught and prodded to see what made him tick.

"Around four o'clock."

"What time is it now?"

He checked his watch. "Quarter 'til two."

"What's your name?"

The man blinked, as if he had just taken a blunder. His wrist was still raised from when he had checked the time. He pushed his sleeve back down and cleared his throat. "Lex...Lexaeus."

"I'm Demyx," the boy nearly overlapped the bulkier man's slow speech. "But you already knew that." He played a random beat on his knees briefly before -- "Sorry, I just need someone to talk to. Gotta keep my sanity..." Another pause. "Is Zexy okay?"

Lexaeus cocked his head and looked up in thought. "You mean Zexion Harris?"

"Yeah."

"He's fine, as far as I know."

"Where is he?"

Lexaeus opened and closed his mouth several times before saying mechanically, "I was told not to disclose such information to you."

Demyx frowned and looked away. "Oh, well...thanks anyway..."

__001__002__ - - - __- - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__ - - - __011__012__013__

whitewhitewhitewhitewhitewhitewhite_whitewhiteWHITE__**WHITE**__!!!!_

_Where's the black, where's the darkness, where can I seclude myself to, where can I __**HIDE!?**_

Two needles in each nook of his arm, pumping sedative into him, but the plinking nuisance of a beep seemed to quicken ever-so-slightly by the minute despite this. Zexion struggled against the straps pulled taut over his naked body, gritting his teeth and widening his eyes. His pupils seemingly dissipated into sharp pin-points.

"_What the hell're you doing?"_

It was then that Zexion noticed all the hands checking and rechecking him and the angry stomping as a being adorned in pink stormed into the snow-white room. He began to scream when the needles were wrenched from his body one by one, cold liquid trickling against his skin. His blood seeped out slovenly, intermingling with the showering medication. He screamed and growled deep in his throat until something soft and dark was placed over his eyes. The muscles in his neck relaxed. _My Darkness..._

"Drugs heighten his power."

The men in scrubs looked from one to the other, a general murmur of "I didn't know"s and "no wonder"s, then back to Marluxia as he placed Zexion's then blindfolded head softly on the table. The beep began to steady into a regular, slow-paced rhythm.

"Whether it be a heavy sedative or a simple intake of ibuprofen, any form of medication will cause him to be more danger_**ous**__!"_

The man of power jolted when he felt the pain of a sword pushing through his heart. He hiccuped, staggering at the force, felt the blood bubble from his mouth, touched his finger to his lips mechanically, but there was no red. No blood. No sword. The doctors looked at him, concerned. Holding his chest with one hand, he fished in his pocket with his other and pushed an earplug into each of Zexion's ears. The young man hissed and spat, struggling to find a window to his enemy's world.

"What he needs is a complete lack of stimulation until the drugs wear off." Marluxia announced as the pain dissolved in his chest, "If he can sense you just enough, he can grab hold of your mind and make you see, feel, and hear things that aren't there. His illusions are so real, it's hard to differentiate. He can drive any human mind insane. A powerful weapon."

"How will we control it?"

Heads turned to the challenging woman's voice. She blew a bubble, snapped it, then chewed on it again. Her stance resembled that of a teenager, indifferent on the job, and yet it was obvious she meant business with the weapons secure on her utility belt. Other than her weapons, she was almost completely void of all clothing. Her hair was fluffy and gray, made up almost like a mohawk but with a pinch of mullet.

"Ah, you must be Ms...?" Marluxia held out his hand, bounding toward the new face through the crowd when --

"Paine."

The woman took one hand out of her crossed arms and grasped Marluxia's. He looked quizzically back at her. "_Pain?_"

"Apparently I wasn't an easy birth." Paine answered in her monotone, not even showing a hint of a joking smile. Marluxia wanted to laugh, but feared being slapped. Or kicked with those buckled boots. All eyes from the handful of scrubs swerved around, wary and scared. Paine regarded them with barely the bat of an eyelid before saying simply, "Get out."

They left in a scramble with no hesitation, scattering like bugs from a tremor in the ground. When the final door closed, she turned her rubies back to Marluxia's sapphires.

"Xig called me over. Said you needed help."

"Help?" Marluxia chuckled with a fabricated smile, "Help with what? I have this all under con_troolllhol!_"

He saw Paine standing there, her gun under his chin. He held his head up, whimpering. Zexion smiled through his gritted teeth, one ice-blue eye fiercely holding the illusion, his own neck arched back to get a clear view with the blindfold half over his face. The real Paine noticed this with her crossed arms, her gun still at her hip, and walked over to above Zexion's head. His neck muscles and veins defined as he bore down with his teeth. She placed a hand on his upside-down cheek before he could send an illusion of literal daggers into her eyes.

"I know where Demyx is," she mouthed articulately.

Zexion's eyes widened before she placed the blindfold back over them. Marluxia spun every which way before finding the actual, non-illusion Paine standing above the operating table. He found his breath and held his heart.

"As I was saying," she continued, her voice vibrating in a small way off the tiled, white walls as she circled Marluxia like a wingless hawk, "How can you control something that only gets stronger the more you _try _to control it?"

"Like I told them," the pink-headed man indicated the departed scrubs with a flick of the head, "a complete lack of stimulation is -- "

"Useless." Paine finished for him, regarding the boy from afar. His quaking became less erratic by the second's passing. Marluxia sputtered.

"Excuse me?" He rather liked his idea and found it quite use_ful_.

"That's as useless as killing him. You need to assimilate his power, not reject it."

The man pouted, crossing his arms in a mock of the silver-haired woman in front of him. She popped another bubble. "I suppose _you _have a suggestion?" Marluxia asked pridefully.

"Bowie."

He rebounded, not expecting an answer so quickly. She enjoyed making him feel clueless, didn't she? "_Demyx _Bowie?"

"He has a soft spot for the kid." Marluxia raised an eyebrow. _You're a "kid" yourself._ "Tell Zexion to do a trick, give him a treat, pat him on the head."

"And the 'treat' is...?"

Those red eyes were more piercing then the invisible sword. "I made it obvious enough."

Marluxia stared at her in disbelief. "You're suggesting we let him see Demyx? We can't let the captives congregate. It's too big of a risk! If they get together, they'll put their heads together and make up a plan of escape!"

"No," Paine held a hand up. "Lead up to it. Monitor it. Let them exchange notes, talk over the phone, but once it gets out of your comfort zone, cut the line. You can get as many tests as you want in until it gets out of hand. Then..." she imitated a knife slicing across her neck soundlessly.

"That's...genius!" Marluxia made to hug the woman, but dropped his arms to his sides instead. She bore far too many jewelry with spikes for an action like that.

"It should be the same with all the others." Paine ordered, breaking the awkward silence. "Love is powerful. Harness it correctly and you'll get unthinkable results."

"True..." Marluxia agreed, eyeing the calmed, slate-haired beast. He floated a hand above his nose. The boy grimaced and let the illusion of pain gather around the hand, but it ebbed away when he remembered Demyx.

_My Demyx..._

Marluxia grinned, placing his hand on the boy's cheek. "Very true."

__001__002__ - - - __- - - __005__006__ - - - __008__009__ - - - __011__012__013__

The young woman sporting her long, white lab coat and goggles and blinding blonde, short hair dashed across the labs, pushing past people, disregarding rude remarks, rattling the cage constantly beating against her leg.

"Superior!" she cried, "_Superior!_"

The white rat jostled in the cage, squeaking and sending sparks, flaming sparks with every utterance. Her brown eyes spotted the tan, brooding man and she gasped, skidding to a stop in front of him, heaving up and down for air.

"What is it, Elena?" He asked, putting a hand to her shoulder as she heaved her lungs. She held up the cage as the white rat coughed, a flash of fire stuttering in front of it. Xemnas's carroty sun's of eyes widened. He relieved the small female of the cage, scrutinizing the essence inside closely.

"This was the one injected with Fox's blood?"

Elena nodded.

"How long will the effects last?"

She shrugged, shaking her head.

"_How long_?"

She swallowed, taking a shrill, glassy breath. "As long as the blood's inside it, it will last...but I think the more blood, the more power."

Xemnas grinned at the small creature, his grimace flashing in the fire light of yet another cough. "Marvelous."


	14. Reward

"How are you, Marluxia?"

The man looked away from the rerun he had been watching of _The Golden Girls_ with slow, dream-like ceruleans as he slowly focused on Dr. Vexen Webb, an old friend of his even before the experiment...but he was so distant. Marluxia's hair had been it's natural light-brown then as opposed to its later, flaming pink. It was cleanly jostled.

"The flower needs water." He simply stated, yawning afterward. Vexen laughed quietly to himself, assuming the drug had made him loopy like the others. He took note of it on his clipboard. "Would you like water then?"

"No," Marluxia yawned airily again, "The flower would." This time he pointed wearily at a softly wilting daisy set at the window sill. Vexen then understood and nodded. "I'll have a nurse get some water for it." He turned on his heel to leave, but --

"Does it look better now, you think?"

Vexen opened his mouth, closed it, then looked back over his shoulder at the daisy. It stood erect, its petals quivering slightly, then wilted once again. Webb flitted his eyes to Marluxia and noticed a look of small concentration as the daisy stood erect again, flourishing and twirling for a moment, then drooping. Webb scratched his pen furiously on paper, his nose still inches off the clipboard when he fled from the room.

When he came back, the daisy's pot was cracked, its roots ascending and descending the walls and creeping along the tiled floor. The daisy itself was enormous -- about the size of a sunflower, brightly grinning at the scientist.

Larxene Nymph, unlike Marluxia Rose, was a late bloomer. She often slept when Vexen went in to check on her and she never showed signs of psychic power of any sort, until she was sent home and awoke the next morning to her alarm clock, which she violently slapped her palm against and fried with a mere thought. She called Vexen the next day and he told her to come in for some tests.

That's how The Org had started. A small circle of people in the community who only knew each other by face got together in a handful of hospital rooms and got injected with a so-called "hallucinogen", somehow coming together when they realized their powers and how to use them -- how they could assassinate, kill, do whatever Xemnas pleaded. Because he became the boss. Whatever the boss says, goes. Yessir, boss. Right away, boss. Anything else, boss?

They didn't know what they were doing exactly, but it was good pay. Everyone supposed that they were just going to have the four kids they were going after join The Org with them, but that didn't seem the case. That didn't seem the case at all.

Xemnas had asked them if they wanted to hop aboard the train, accepting high pay in top-notch jobs with their exquisite skills, but Axel, the leader of the pack, declined. Instead, Xemnas persisted in closely monitoring them, telling Axel that once the boy hit puberty, he was to be brought in for immediate experimentation. When Roxas had been taken into Reno Fox's apartment building, they had assumed Axel was attempting to hide the boy, and Xemnas took this chance up to break the deal and swipe up all four of the remaining experimentees. But for what? He never dared tell anyone.

Vexen had been the one who had set up the experiment. Vexen was the one who injected everyone with the hallucinogen. Vexen, however, was the only one who was different in the Org. Xemnas proposed he join, and that he did, but being Head of the Science Department...didn't do it for him. He didn't think he was enough for his friend since _grade _school that he so admired -- Marluxia Rose. He even spied, with great contempt, him sneaking coveted glances at Larxene Nymph in the halls, small pecks on the lips, even the occasional grope.

Vexen Webb couldn't control his so-called "admiration". He would gain back the Rose's cerulean eyes. He would have them fall on him again. He knew this very well as he set the cold needle to the nook in his elbow, pushing down to inject the cold liquid into him. He fell asleep on his desk soon afterward and woke with a start in what seemed like seconds, but it must have been well over three hours. The puddle on his research papers suggested as much.

"You were snoring, Vexy."

He started again, a small utterance of surprise escaping his throat as he tried to clear it, simultaneously wiping his eye and cheek to get the sleep out of his face. "I told you not to call me that."

"Why not? I think it's cute."

The man shuffled closer in a blasé fashion as Vexen contemplated his hand he suspended in front of him. His skin was unbearably white -- alabaster with faded creeks of blue branching out over his thin, distending bones.

"You're so pale," Marluxia denoted, inching closer to the doctor still with his hands behind his back. He bent over just enough so Vexen could see his dingy, blue eyes studying his hand under those eyelashes, those sandy bangs. Vexen snapped out of his trance, shaking his head and burying his face in the hand. Marluxia grinned. "Did I frighten you that much?"

"Please, Marluxia, another time..." The voice was muffled. The younger, smoother man cocked his head to the side and reached out his own hand. "You're shivering! I didn't know I was that -- " he touched Vexen's wrist and seemed to congeal in an instant, his mouth still open, his tongue still at the back of his teeth. All the heat escaped his palm, his arm, his chest, his --

He pushed away with an effort, the quaking transferred to him. He swore he could see his breath. Vexen looked up at him, recoiling at the distasteful look of trepidation the man gave him, but more than that -- it was a look of pure abhorrence.

Without a word, he turned his back to him and fled, never exchanging a word with the doctor again. Vexen sat there, shivering, despite the heat he stole from the Rose.

Three teardrops sprinkled on his hand and crystalized.

Roxas hung his head upside-down over the foot of the bed, his eyes red from crying. He'd finished up that nonsense a while ago. Then, he wished he had some sort of stimulation, so he resorted to making blood rush to the top of his head because he knew there were cameras around that prohibited _that_ kind of stimulation. Or at least, made it less private.

He heard the mechanical door shift open a way's away, the roaring murmur of voices, people, _life_. He hoped to God it wasn't "Mansex" or whatever...or that creepy-ass janitor again. The door then closed and the voices were gone. Roxas thought on it again and decided his company would probably be appreciated. He wasn't reprimanding like the challenging voice over the intercom -- he was human.

But above all things, he hoped it would be Axel coming to visit. "Hey, kid! April Fool's! Awesome joke, huh? We were never running from a government agency in the first place! It was all a six-year, ongoing joke!"

Hah. Fat chance.

"Kid?"

Roxas jumped at the familiar nickname, his stomach doing heavy somersaults as he spun around, back on his stomach, his hopes high until the eye-patched man's face appeared in the doorway. His excitement diminished as the pirate-esque character opened his mouth to speak. "I was sent for you. We gotta head over to the labs."

Roxas glared at him, flipped over so his head was at the top of the bed, and pulled a pillow over his face. Xigbar considered him for a moment, shrugged, then turned around with an indifferent, "Mmkay."

A small gasp. A sense of longing built up in Roxas's chest. That's it? No fight, no struggle, just curl up into a ball and _bam_, you're off the hook? He pulled the detergent-smelling pillow from his face and rolled onto his haunches, glowering at the receding back. The man turned around with a smirk as if he was expecting it.

"What're you playing at?" It was the first time Xigbar actually heard Roxas speak. Not a whimpering mumble meant for the boy himself, but a hot, angry voice meant for Xigbar, inquiring _him_. As rude and imposing as it was, he had to admit it was a treat.

"I'm not '_playing at_' anything." Xigbar lied, but in a very convincing way (maybe a little too convincing), "You don't want to go so I won't force you."

Roxas opened his mouth, at a loss for words. Xigbar couldn't help but snigger. The kid _wanted _a fight, but he wasn't going to give him one. He wanted to hold the hidden pain over his head until he was on his knees, begging to see what was inside.

"I'll just stay here then," Roxas crossed his arms, "I'll never go down there."

"Awesome." Xigbar pulled his card out of his breast pocket, poising to swipe, "I guess that other kid will have to be disappointed."

The cat straightened up, alert. "What other kid?" Even if it was Demyx, Zexion, he didn't care.

"The Fox one."

Roxas almost fell face-first into the floor when he leaped from the bed, but quickly regained his former scowl. "You're bluffing. You know about us."

"Huh?" Xigbar looked back with sincere-seeming confusing.

"You're just trying to crack me," Roxas deepened his glower, "Trying to get me to participate so you can take my blood."

_Easy...easy, Xig..._"Kid, I'm just doing my job. That Fox guy I talked to just a few minutes ago will be leaving the lab at any minute now. If we don't hurry, he'll be disappointed because he won't get to see you."

_Hook_. Xigbar saw it in those glorious, blue orbs -- the reflection of guilt. A lump developing in the boy's throat. The thought of disappointing his most loved one irked him.

"Fine," Roxas mumbled, his head hung. He padded up to Xigbar, following him like a lost puppy.

Xigbar couldn't suppress his devilish grin. _Note to self: guilt-trips are super-effective._

_"You're bigger than I expected, my Nightingale. Ohh, and you're hard?"_

_"St-stop it!"_

Zexion slept in every way but peacefully. He grumbled and tossed his head from side to side spasmodically, veins popping, sweat scintillating in the small light of the dark room, strands of bangs sticking to his cheek. The rest of his body jerked and rattled the table he was fixedly strapped to, aforesaid table solidly bolted to the floor.

_A second, willowy finger wriggled its way inside. The pressure alarmed him as a small grunt escaped from behind his scrunched face. He could feel the man's nails grate against the ductile tissue inside him. He threw his head back and screamed, entirely violated. He found the man's shoulders with his piddling hands, exerting to shove him off._

_"Oh, nononono__**no**__!" Marluxia promptly picked the feeble hand from his shoulder off as if it were a kitten's paw, "My cherished Nightingale, __**this**__ is the chastening for disobedient, little boys who go out at night without their parents to look over them."_

"Zexion."

The metal of the table clattered when the then older Zexion woke with a heavy start, his eyes broad and alert, the blindfold then at his mouth, functioning as a make-shift gag. The moment he spotted that deceiving face of an angel framed by salmon-colored hair, he felt the debauch dragon roar from inside him, jolting his throat and fixing his eyes.

"Before you aspire to engross my mind with chimeras," the figure of authority told the younger boy as if beginning a lecture distributed from father to son, just as it had felt those years ago, "I have some _things_ you may want to consider."

His dress shoes tapped lightly on the tile floor, deflecting off the equally tiled walls as his daintily rendered voice did. "The drugs have worn off by now, so you've been reduced to your usual, _daydream_-making self. Small things like...that dollar mishap a while back. Those teensy little things that give you migraines. Say good bye to sending swords through my back for a while."

Zexion squinted his eyes at his blue-tinted neck hovering only a few feet above him, that thin trachea...pinpointing the pain and pressure of a strong thumb pressing down. Marluxia reacted to the first notice of this by flinching, but easily shook it off.

"I know it isn't real, my flower," that disgusting, mocking smile, "so it's just a funny joke to me."

He hooked a finger under the cloth, pulling it down to his chin. Though this blockage of speech was lifted, Zexion didn't make any effort to speak. He kept his eyes keenly locked with the far darker blue ones in front of him.

"If you do whatever I say," Marluxia began, sitting at the side of the table, "I'll let you see Demyx."

A small pause. It was what Marluxia expected -- a small shine of hope sparkling in the one eye visible, but it quickly deepened into a not-so-expected, disdainful smirk. "Wouldn't it make more _sense_," Zexion commented in his condescending tone, "if you do whatever I say if I do whatever you say? That's a far better exchange. We both get equal slices of the cake."

A hand slapped on the table, Marluxia challenging the conjurer by inching closer to his face. "You certainly like to play with your words, don't you?" He caressed the pale skin of his cheek with the back on his hand. Zexion spat at him through his slate hair, black in the dark.

"I'm not the only one who plays with their language. Unlike some people, however, I don't use it quite so..._frivolously._"

The Org official bit his lip, hiding this weakness by licking the lip swiftly afterward. "What is it you have in mind for say...an equal exchange?"

"I'd rather not repeat myself."

Marluxia's eyes shrank into chinks and he climbed onto the table in a trice, metal creaking and whining. He straddled the boy effortlessly. "You're more of a bitch than that 'Paine'-in-the-ass, aren't you?"

Suddenly Zexion's arm was free, his fist colliding with Marluxia's nose. He saw sparks dance across the darkness as he held his nose. Was it broken? He looked back at his attacker, completely bound to the table, a small puff above one of his eyebrows. Oh. It was just another show of his.

But why was he breathing heavily like that? Marluxia bent down closer to find out, running his finger across the bump. The skin around it clasped. Zexion's eyes were smoky -- he was hardly conscious.

"A small hemorrhage, hm?" Marluxia absolutely radiated with schemes. He stroked the spot gently with a slender pinky, coquetting it. "You don't even have to _see_ Demyx in order to do as I say. You can't push much harder, can you?"

He answered with naught but his arduous breaths. He endeavored to stay conscience, but fell in and out, in and out..._breathe...don't let --_

"Push anymore, and your cute little brain will just..._pop!_" Marluxia reminded the victim underneath his torso. He giggled to himself giddily at this gruesome yet comical thought, clapping joyfully. "Wonderful! Just..._wonderful_."


	15. Restrict

Six years ago, Xigbar was just beginning his job as an assassin. They called him a bounty hunter, but he preferred _assassin_ more than anything. It made him sound snake-like and deadly, and he always pictured a ninja wrapped in black shrouds when he heard it -- "assassin". So cool.

At that time, Xigbar almost fit the description of "ninja" in "ninja assassin". His hair was solid black, still always bound in a tail, and he had both of his gleaming, lemon eyes. The only sign of his occupation he bore was the nasty scar up his cheek, still tinged red at the time due to its age of only a couple weeks. Some people didn't go easily.

The night was young and he was off duty swaying down the alleyway between Luna hospital and the brown houses. The trash cans were washed in yellow light at the sound of a door bursting open, dust particles floating and fleeing. A pale hand was revealed out the hospital backdoors, throwing out a metal tray, glass clinking and shattering as it made contact with the concrete in front of the garbage. There was a small wail that Xigbar couldn't tell if it was the door's hinges or the previous holder of the metal tray. All he knew then was the alley was in dusty darkness again and all he _wanted_ to know was what was in that tray.

He ran his hands over the metallic piece of equipment, picking up small, wet shards of glass here and there. He found a rather large chunk of the glass, holding it between his forefinger and thumb up to the moonlight. It was once part of a thin cylinder -- a syringe. The translucent, green liquid still clung to its edges, but what peaked Xigbar's curiosity was the label hanging off the side.

HALLUCINOGEN

Huh. Some crazy experiment the equally crazy scientist of Luna hospital decided to throw out due to its, perhaps, failure? No doubt. No wonder he didn't even chance an actual name at it.

Xigbar squinted and huffed as he twirled the piece of glass in his finger, making to set it down, but hissed as its sharp edge broke his skin and before he knew it, his finger began to tingle, blood not even escaping the deep cut. Instead, acidic bubbles simmered from the open wound. Xigbar, terrified of this reaction, proceeded in squeezing the substance out of his finger, but the creeping sensation was already to his shoulder...

He bound up, trying to shake it off, wriggling every limb, until he swore he was just sand, floating in the air, sprinkling, dancing -- he _was _that tingling sensation. He felt dream-like for just a moment, studying his nearly transparent hand, when he felt a vacuum suck him up and dump him in a room void of all color, cold against his bare skin as he fell in a heap on the ground.

He instantly brought his limbs closer to his body, not even wanting to think about where the hell his clothes disappeared off to. All he thought was he was so cold, so he could see his breath puffing out in front of him. This..._was_ the hospital, wasn't it? Never mind _that_. How the fuck did he get there?

The stinging sensation infused with shivering from the cold, his teeth chattering, but the tingling bled through everything else, rumbling through him once again, like an ocean of insects swarming over his body. Then they all seemed to bite him at once and he screamed, opening his eyes to an office. He had somehow made it to directly behind an office desk in the hospital. It was colder here. And he could hear crying.

As carefully as he could, he poked his head over the desk to try and get a peek of this possible source of arctic hospital. Lo and behold, there stood the infamous, mad scientist, adorned in his white lab coat, his back against the world as it shook up and down from his sobs.

Xigbar's legs were quaking as he attempted to pull himself up with the desk's aid and tip toe away as stealthy as a naked man possibly could, but his hand slipped. The thin, glass rose ornament Dr. Vexen Webb kept at all times near him wobbled on its based, tipped over the edge of the surface of the desk, and shattered on the floor. There was a stunning silence that followed as Vexen flinched, spinning around to seek out the source of this corruption. Xigbar curled just in time into a fetal position under the desk, praying the spontaneous, throbbing feeling would regain and take him far away where he could get dressed and crawl under a warm blanket.

When he spotted the locks of blond hanging over the desk, he willed everything he could to_ get the fuck out of there _and the tingling flew threw him like adrenaline. There was a loud _crack_ accompanied by a squelching sound.

Xigbar decided later on that he shouldn't rush his power, or else all of him wouldn't make it to the other side. When Vexen recovered from the deafening noise, he circled around his desk and plucked up an eagle-yellow eyeball from a puddle of red. He later did tests on the organic material and found traces of hallucinogen inside. There was a thirteenth specimen that he must have overlooked...one that could teleport, with it's few, yet deadly, fallbacks.

It was then that Vexen described this project in the Org's databank appropriately -- Project 013.

"Hey, mullet head."

Said mullet head looked up from his bowl of cereal mid-chew. The drugs in the food were little, and he hardly needed them, but they certainly had an effect on him. He was far more spacy than usual and he had tiny bags under his eyes. He was eating more than usual, addicted to the drug inside. This had the opposite effect on his weight -- he got skinnier. It took him a while to process the image of Paine walking into his cell, her arms crossed, her hips swinging.

"_Aunt Paine_?" He whispered disbelievingly, rising from his seat and walking to her, leaving his raisin bran to sog. "Are you really Aunt Paine or am I going crazy?"

"I'm really Aunt Paine, but you're still going crazy," she remarked with a smile as Demyx cried out, embracing her. Her guns poked into his hips, but he didn't care. He could _cry_ from all the hope that filled him up.

He gasped, resurfacing from the hug and swiveling his head in every direction. "They're listening, aren't they?"

"I unplugged the cameras and mics connected to your room and messed with everyone's schedules, so it'll take 'em a while to figure out." Paine answered, sitting on the couch to get comfortable, "So we can talk business."

"You're going to get us out of here?" Demyx asked in amazement, kneeling on the floor in front of her like he used to as a child when she began one of her many stories.

"Why else would I visit my favorite nephew?" That half-smile came back, like a drained warrior rising from the fallen battlements.

"How'd you know we were here?" Demyx pressed, genuinely curious. He didn't think they'd broadcast something like _this _on the news...yet.

"I have connections with Xigbar, second-in-command here." she admitted, "Guy visits the bar a lot, gets drunk, has a big mouth. Dem..." she started, standing and immediately beginning to pace, "I convinced them to let you four talk to one another bit-by-bit, by notes, phone, then personally, but every ounce of communication will be monitored."

Demyx shook his head, unable to suppress his grin from ear-to-ear. "You mean...I get to talk with Zexy again?"

Paine nodded gravely, holding out a small piece of paper. "I will try my best to be the monitor, but try and be as esoteric as possible just in case."

"I'll...I'll try..." Demyx stammered, squinting at the blank sheet when Paine gave him a mechanical pencil.

"Good." she swiped her card at the door, "I gotta run. See ya."

The door closed, Demyx flinching as he poised his pencil above his world to be filled with language.

Weeks and months went by and everyone wondered how the captives didn't go insane from lack of mutual, human contact. They didn't know, save for a select few, that they were communicating amongst each other. According to Xemnas, it was to keep them all sane enough to cope with and to bribe them into using their powers for tests. According to Paine, it was to keep them sane as well, and also to try and build up a plan for escape that they could possibly pass between each other. However, her luck at being the monitor ran thin several times because of Xemnas's lack of trust in her.

Paine visited the other three shortly after she dropped in to see Demyx. Roxas was a good kid, even if he did tend to nibble the hand that feeds with a bit of angst. He was the most unaffected of them all, and Paine couldn't help but question why. He informed her that his supervisor, Xigbar, was a nice guy, and he was constantly trying to set up dates for Axel and him to meet in secret, but they always fell through. She then remembered Xigbar telling her to get the whole "communication bribe" going in order to "pry the kid open".

Zexion was almost the same as Roxas, but more condescending and _addled. _One of his eyes was raveled in a map of crimson roads and he twitched and shook mildly. Paine could tell he tried to hide it, but it only made it more obvious. She knew he wasn't going to last in a place like that, especially if they made him use his power on such a daily basis and have such high expectations. He was nearing the brink.

"So it hurts to do it now?"

"It's _always _hurt, but I can't _even_ do it anymore." The young man looked up from behind his slate-gray hair, quivering as if cold, the sheet of white in his hand crinkling. There were dark circles under his eyes that made him look significantly older. "Knives stab into my head when I even try to _think_. The numb spot on my face is growing and they keep making me..._he, _Marluxia, keeps making me make _illusions _for him, and I can hardly make a puff of smoke. He says if I don't do it, he'll..." he shook his head and instantly changed the subject, "They're all getting fed up with it and want to give me pain killers, but that I'm sure that just dulls the _pain_, not the actual damage it does to my body. I'm...I'm...dying..."

Paine put a hand solemnly on his shoulder as he looked down, replacing tears with dry, choking sobs that made her stomach churn. They sat on the metal table across from one another, Zexion with the paper in his hands and a thin, white robe draped over his back with nothing else (he lost his shame somewhere during those countless tests they performed on him) and Paine sitting opposite of him, connected.

"Thank you..." he breathed, seeing his former sanity and comfort reflected in the white paper. Paine nodded that he was welcome.

Axel Fox wasn't exactly _fun_ to visit. The temperature was enough to make her instantly perspire upon entry into his lair, and it took several minutes to finally gain his trust. He was on edge -- an edge not so different from Zexion's, but he showed his discontent with fury and heat, nearly blistering Paine's skin when he turned to her. At the mention of Roxas Hart, the fire was doused and his look disintegrated into a faraway stare of longing. The temperature dropped significantly.

He was emaciated -- even more than his picture she'd seen. He wasn't eating. He hated medication, even if he couldn't taste it. Hell, it wasn't the taste that bothered him, it was the _idea_. This medication, these _drugs_, were meant to control him, to tame the fire.

It's going to take hell of a lot more than starvation to put this one out.

"Hey, kid..." Axel said into the receiver. Roxas hated how his voice sounded then -- like he'd smoked seven cigarettes at one time. It cracked and aired and he coughed subtly when he was through with the first two words he'd said to the boy in months...or maybe it was a year...?

"Hi, Axel..." Roxas's voice was broken. Sad. He rubbed the nook of his elbow where they just recently drew blood.

"How's it going?"

A small pause as he slid to the floor. Xigbar was watching him keenly from the observation room. "Good." He choked back tears.

"This is torture, Rox..." Axel said with meaning, sensing the impending tears, "You're so close that I could probably touch you if it weren't for these walls."

"Yeah...I know." He was making it worse.

"Do you think we'll ever see the light of day again?"

Roxas blinked, a tear sliding down to his lips. He laughed slightly to pass the wrenching noises as sobs of joy he was unable to contain. "I can't even remember the last time I saw the _sky_."

Zexion woke with a terrible start, sweat beaded against his pale skin, cold on the metal table beneath him. The robe they gave him on behalf of his complaints of comfort was strewn out on the floor. He breathed as if he just resurfaced from an underwater cage surrounded by sharks. His throat was raspy, and he touched it with a cool hand to relieve it.

What he just awoke from wasn't a nightmare, but a gigantic leap into a collective thought pool. Information flooded to him in torrents as he held his head. He was holding in his terrible power so long, he couldn't control it anymore. It was as if it was six

(seven?)

years ago all over again, and the drug just entered his body.

(CRUTCH, XIGBAR forty-two missing right eye teleports killed VEXEN befriended ROXAS _ROXAS IS THE NEXT TARGET_)

The door opened and Zexion jumped, shaking uncontrollably. The visitor who entered was someone he had not expected, but who had obviously been expecting him. Standing at four feet exactly in sandaled feet and a blue, plaid dress to her knees, Naminé Rose was a fascinating sight to see in the middle of a white room. Her hands were folded behind her back and she walked toward Zexion with the air of her mother, flat chest high and business-like. She didn't look up at the Illusionist of similar power -- only stared forward with blind eyes.

"Zexion," the name sounded strange in such a small voice, "I'm here to tell you what I'm supposed to."

Zexion looked down at the girl, gathering his robe and wrapping it around him, despite the apparent fog in her eyes. He hung his legs off the metal surface, not taking his icy blues from her face perfectly set amongst golden locks.

"When you see my daddy," she began simply, "give him a little _push_."

_Daddy? _"Little girl, I don't --"

"Yes, you do," she cut in, but somehow not rude at all, "His name's Marluxia."

A compound of fear and hatred shot through the boy's body like fiery ice. "What do you mean...'_a push_'?"

"Like you usually do, but with your brain." A somewhat sinister smile seemed to quiver across her lips like Death, "but you're pushing his brain with yours."

"I can't do it anymore." the former Illusionist, beaten down and weary, replied dryly, licking his chapped lips, "Besides, I don't even know if you're real. You can't make me do what you say."

Naminé plucked the mechanical pencil he used for his letters to Demyx from the floor, next to a table leg, once he finished his sentence, twirling it in her fingers like a baton, then headed toward the wall with a sly smirk.

The effect was instantaneous. The automatic door flew open and a flurry of pink and black cascaded into the room, colliding with the young girl who shrieked as she was knocked to the ground.

"Naminé!" Marluxia scolded, picking the kicking girl up off the floor with visible effort. "_How did you get out of your cell_!?"

(do it now please do it now)

A chill went up Zexion's spine. He could've sworn he just heard the girl

(Naminé?)

screaming and pleading for help in his head, echoing. She wailed and struggled in her father's arms as he brought out a syringe, getting ready to

(do it now push him hard I can't do it now make him go away)

inject her right in the neck. Zexion watched blankly, dumbstruck as the girl --

(set me free Zexion set me free MAKE HIM GO AWAY AND WE'LL ALL BE SET FREE!!!)

It wasn't even an illusion as Zexion cried out, sending a wave straight toward Marluxia's forehead. He dropped the syringe and it shattered on the floor, the transparent liquid fizzing. He turned his head mechanically toward Zexion and stared upon him like a deer in the headlights. Naminé moved out of his limp arms and smiled, rocking on her heels as she looked past Zexion. Her father stood up as if hypnotized, turning around and heading out the door, his mind a void of white. Zexion still stared after the door closed behind him.

"See?" Naminé whispered, stepping closer to him, "It doesn't even hurt you, does it?"

Zexion could only shake his head. His illusions brought a a vice to his head tightly clamped around it, but this new discovery...it felt like a pinch at the temples and that was the end of it. "What did I do to him?"

"You made him realize..." Naminé simply stated, a frown and a tinge of sadness finally finding her face, "...how horrible his life has been."

Zexion blinked. This girl knew too much. She was gaining the information as she spoke to him. Her eyes moved swiftly across the air, as if she was reading a book in front of her. Her eyes quickly filled with tears and she collapsed to the floor, burying her face in her hands.


	16. Revisit

A/N - Extra points to anyone who can figure out where the line Marluxia says about Larxene hating him come from. Yeah boiiiiii.

The kitchen.

Marluxia discovered long ago that whenever he was upset, he found himself in the kitchen. There was something about the environment that was healing, something about it that made him reflect, remember. He clenched both hands on either side of the sink, contemplating. _Maybe...I'll wash some vegetables._

He took a tomato from the vegetable basket on the island and ran it under hot water.

_"See how it splits like a fork?"_

_The young Marluxia studied the tomato plant but didn't dare touch it as the older boy handled it. He indicated a sprout in between the two prongs with two taps of a long finger. The brown-haired boy nodded._

_"You have to pluck the sprout in the middle. It lets the plant grow better. Tomatoes won't grow on it, so it's just sucking the life out of the rest of the plant. It's useless."_

_He dug the sprout out, flicking it to the ground. Marluxia watched with no remorse, picking his head up to look at Vexen Webb in the sun's silhouette._

His hands were turning red under the water and he dropped the tomato. It rolled straight down into the drain, plugging it up.

_"Marluxia, you shouldn't be seeing her anymore."_

_Vexen dabbed his arm with a hot rag as Marluxia hissed and pouted up to him. "I can't, Vexy."_

_A muscle in the scientist's jaw twitched at the nickname, but softened. "And why not?" He stopped shifting the rag, loosening his grip._

_"If she does this to me when she _likes _me, imagine what she'd do if she _hated_ me!"_

_(But she _does_ hate you!")_

He lifelessly watched as the metal basin filled with hot water, his finger tips touching the surface of the steaming liquid, nearly scorching his skin.

"You love me, don't you?"

He saw Larxene's younger, more placid face morph into the reflection of the water. He solemnly shook his head. "I...I do."

"Then why don't you love _her_?"

Larxene's face was pushed back into the tomato, replaced with a seemingly younger version of her with sparkling blue eyes. Naminé looked up at him hopelessly, those eyes full of tears. She was only two years old, her hair still fine and practically peach fuzz. He hit the water with his fist, pounding the tomato down the drain and into the idle garbage disposal. Water splashed up and sprinkled his face, burning slightly at the touch. He flicked on a switch above the sink, the gears cranking and grinding the produce inside and slopping up the water. He spun around, the gears still howling, only to have his heart leap out of his chest at the sight of Vexen Webb standing above him, eyes resembling Naminé's glossy one's very easily but with their hue of emerald instead.

"You loved me, Marluxia," the apparition accused, looking down as Marluxia held his heart, breathing fast, "You loved me, but you turned me down for someone who didn't love you back, and for what?"

Marluxia's eyes widened and began to fill with tears of fear themselves. The steam from the sink made him perspire as he pushed backwards against it.

"So Xemnas could see what would happen if two people injected with hallucinogen had a child. So you got married, had a child, and you treated her like _dirt_!"

"What about _you_ Vexen!?" Marluxia hollered over the grinding of the disposal, "Remember how you treated all of us in the experi --!?" His voice dwindled off and his eyes widened in fear as Vexen shrank, smaller than him, and his hair retracted into his head, turning slate-gray. A twelve-year-old Zexion Harris was standing in front of him, looking up.

But that wasn't all.

Other young children and women lined up behind him, people he only knew by face and body. They were all completely naked, shaking at the knees, bleeding from their genitals or openings. One behind Zexion, the tallest of all of them, fell to the ground, shivering and convulsing.

"See how you've tortured us?"

Marluxia could only sputter, guilt and fear churning in his abdomen like starvation.

"Daddy..." Zexion wasn't Zexion anymore -- he was now Naminé, six years old and standing naked, too, among the victims of rape, her eyes as blind as ever, "Why do you exist?"

The man belted out a final, howling scream of all the agony he had endured, and he felt it all as he plunged his arm down the the sink, down the drain, into the the swirling blades of the garbage disposal. He felt the blood and flesh chip away, felt it eat and grind and twist all the way to the bone as it whined and cried, jammed and clicked.

It wasn't long before darkness enveloped him. It was silent in the kitchen, save for the low humming of the machine under the sink.

Upon entering Roxas's cell, Xigbar was pleased with several things. For one, Roxas was up and about, watching the television, obviously waiting for him. For another, when he saw that it was Xigbar entering his cell, he managed a half smile. It wasn't just any smile. It was a smile accompanied by a, "Hey, Xig."

It was time to finally talk about his power. He knew it was a touchy subject with the kid since all the time he tried to get around to mentioning it, Roxas inconspicuously changed the subject on him. Now, he _had_ to be comfortable enough to talk about it.

"Hey, kiddo." Xigbar smiled, the door closing behind him as he came closer to him. Roxas stood, straightening his white garments out. It looked like he was getting ready for a rudimentary date. The older man couldn't help but lick his lips, "I was thinking maybe you'd want to go, say...on a walk?"

"_Walk_...?" Roxas hadn't heard or said the word in so long. He and Axel used to go on walks all the time to get away from Zexion and Demyx, leaving them to have their "alone time". A smile lit up his entire face and he nodded. Xigbar laughed jovially, putting his arm around him and patting his shoulder, leading him out the door. The halls, to Roxas's partial dismay, were desolate. He inched away from Xigbar, signaling his discomfort, so the older man glanced down at him and removed his arm.

"Thanks," he mumbled, his eyebrows bending into their troubled stance. _Uh oh_.

"No problem," he replied gruffly with a toothy grin, scratching the base of his ponytail, "It's the least I could do for a kid like you."

A small hint of crimson stroked Roxas's cheeks and Xigbar smiled successfully to himself as he led the boy out the door to the outside world. Flattery was a weakness he discovered long before that day.

When they pushed open the doors, the hinges squeaked and Roxas felt as if he'd have a seizure from the overload of light and color. His eyes watered and leaked and he had to rub them several times before they became less sensitive and used to such amazing stimulation. It was then that they began their walk along the dirt path, skirting at the border of the wood.

At first, they talked about normal things -- teenage things. Granted, Roxas didn't exactly talk about _normal_ teenage boy things, being so attached to a twenty-one-year-old man like Fox. Most boys his age beat off to busty women in porno magazines and fantasized about banging the girl in front of them in geometry class. Roxas, on the other hand, tended to talk about nothing but Axel, though he was careful not to let slip how attached he was to the man, though it was obvious by the sheer amount of how much he mentioned him. Xigbar couldn't help but feel a small tinge of jealously.

"How're the tests going?" the one-eyed man popped the question after a long moment of nothing but their shoes crunching in the gravel. Roxas took the blow, wavering slightly on the spot. The man regarded the boy -- a forlorn angel dressed in his garments of white, his golden bangs shading his eyes as his head dropped.

"Fine, I guess."

The discomfort was clear, but Xigbar was certain this was the best time to reel him in. He had to pull him in before he realized the hook was in his lip. Wait any longer and the kid would go insane. His talks with Axel had an opposite effect to the desired reaction. He was turning his nose up from the bait.

"Look, kid, I know you don't like talking about it," Xigbar proclaimed in a soothing voice -- very sincere, "but I heard something a while ago that you should know about. It's important."

There was another extended length of time where only the birds and gravel were heard. Then Roxas built up the courage to pick up his head and utter, "I'm listening."

Xigbar nodded in understanding at his visible face, then looked outward to begin his explanation. "Vexen Webb, the leader of the experiment those years ago, told me this before he died. He believes that your healing power not only takes someone's wound or pain, but also pulls out a bit of their power."

Roxas stared at the older man incredulously. "You mean...if they _have _a power."

"Yeah, of course," he laughed nervously, itching his cheek, "like, from the hallucinogen. And it's not really...taking out their power temporality like you do with wounds, but copying them entirely."

Roxas stopped in his tracks, staring blankly at a tree far off in front of him. "Copy, huh?"

A stab of panic jabbed at Xigbar and he patted the boy on the shoulder, quickly saying, "But you don't want to use the power _now_, you know. The old man could've been _way _off, or it could be potentially dangerous if not in a controlled environment. You could hurt someone, especially if you don't know the extent of it or can't control it once it begins, just like that Fox kid."

Roxas turned his face up to that scarred, beaten one above him, his sapphire eyes beautiful in the sunlight. He turned back to facing the large oak. "I understand."

"Good." the nervous one dropped his hand, swinging it slightly, then scratching the back of his head. He always felt so itchy when he thought things weren't going the way he wanted them too.

"So, that means I have Axel's power?" the small one said rather dreamily, "and Zexion's, and Demyx's too. He had a papercut a while back, so I healed it for him." He stared more intently at the tree.

Xigbar felt his heart fall into his stomach when heated energy darted past him to the tree, the tall oak cracking into flames. Roxas smirked at him but he didn't see it as his access card was nicked from his breast pocket and the young boy took off back toward The Org's headquarters, ripping through the grass, thinking of nothing but his destination. His love. His life. _Axel._

"_Roxas!" _Xigbar bellowed his actual name for the first time, bolting after the boy. His body was overcome with that sensation -- as if he was at the bottom of an hourglass and sand was cascading down on him as he pumped his legs toward the blonde, gaining on him easily. The last image the patched man saw was Roxas glancing over his shoulder, those seas of blue widening before he tackled him to the grass, grasping for some bit of skin -- his neck.

The scrawny captive wriggled like a worm, grunting and panting incoherently as he felt his skin prickle from where Xigbar was holding him at his collar bones. Then he felt as if all the air was shoved out of his lungs and ripped through a thin pipe, Xigbar along with him, still gripping tightly onto his neck.

After several labored breaths surrounded by white quiet, Roxas relaxed and opened his eyes, jumping at the contorted visage floating above him in a tangle of thick, black, white, and gray hair. A yellow eye to the right, a gaping maw where an eye was supposed to be to the left. What horrified the teenage boy the most was the undeniable fact that they were both naked, the older man on top of the other.

"_Crutch!_" Xemnas's voice crackled over the intercom all around them, "What on Earth is --!?"

The two of them washed in red even visible to the black and white cameras.

Larxene was beginning to worry. Naminé was missing -- it had been reported that she was seen near Zexion's cell, but everyone was too terrified of Zexion to go and check. Not to mention there was a pencil in that room, and she wouldn't hesitate to slit her wrists to add color and make her drawings effective.

Her heels clicked past the kitchen door and she froze. Spin around. Go back. She pressed her fingertips to the door, the red on her nails standing out against the white. She could hear an idle whirring from inside, akin to a ceiling fan put on a high setting. Yeesh. Just what The Org needed -- a power waster. She turned the knob and pushed the door open.

What hit her first was the smell -- not too different from bloody meat that had stayed out for an hour or so -- very metallic, rotten. She gasped and clamped her hand to her nose and mouth. As she stepped in, swatting a fly away, she took in the sight.

Her husband's blood sprayed across the metal basin, the floor, his body. His back was to her, but his form was agitated enough by the garbage disposal that he was on his knees, his mess of half-eaten tendrils and dangling, fleshy bits of skin left on his arm nearly out of the sink. Bone fragments ground to pink powder, arteries and veins hanging limply over the edge of the counter.

Larxene grit her teeth, biting back tears she thrust her fists down to her sides. "You idiot..." she whimpered, "_You __**idiot!**__"_

She pulled at every pot and pan she could get her claws on, throwing them across the kitchen, clanging and crashing. She pulled open the cabinets and forced the china plates across the counters and shattered them on the floor, picking them up and trying again if they didn't break the first time. She screamed, tears running down her reddening face as she punched the wall, cracking her knuckles. Her fist went limp, her back slack, and she reduced to a defeated child on the floor.

"Marluxia..." she curled into a ball on her side, the tile cold on her cheek. He didn't answer. "Did you do this because of me...?"

The answer was a frosty silence and the hum of fly wings, attracted to the taste of suicide in the air, and the low rumble of the garbage disposal, still running. Larxene hated these sounds.

She summoned enough strength and her lack of spirit to eventually push herself up on shaky knees, kicking her heels off. She could only stand in them when she felt powerful. She padded, soulless, over to the form of her former lover. His face was hidden in his hair, the pink hidden in splashes of red. She stooped down, holding the edge of the slippery sink for support. It trembled lowly underneath her palm.

Carefully, she pushed his hair out of his face. As covered in crimson as it was, his face was the most peaceful she'd ever seen it in her lifetime. A surge of hot anger, almost jealousy, shot through her and she slapped him clean across the face. Miniscule droplets of his liquids hit her own face, and the force of the blow caused him to squelch into a lumpy mess on the floor.

Her piercing eyes gouged his form out and she clenched down hard on the sink's border, screaming a scream heard throughout the headquarters as the disposal quaked and all the lights throughout the building bloomed and buzzed, burning out momentarily. The whole world in darkness.

Xemnas's image of the two in the cell died out. _Every_ image available to him died out. His voice cut off completely in the room, with Xigbar and Roxas. Xigbar's heart leapt.

"Roxas?"

There was no answer, not even breathing. Eventually the boy found his lungs again and asked, "Yeah?"

"Did the power just go out?"

"Y-yeah. I think so."

A smile in the dark, the biggest one Xigbar had done yet. A smile no one would ever see. Roxas wiggled and twitched slightly beneath him. "Can you...can you get off me now?"

Xigbar chuckled, snaking his rough hands down Roxas's smooth arms and pinning down his wrists with a gratifying thump and quick gasp from the boy. "No kid, can't say I can."

The kitten mewled in terror as his face was surrounded by bushy, greasy locks and Xigbar found his lips with his mouth, biting down on the bottom one. The kiss was so wet, Roxas literally gagged as the man resurfaced, a large smacking noise rewarding him. He laughed as he went to plant more heart-ripping kisses along his vibrating, screaming-for-help trachea.

He didn't care anymore. Xemnas caught him, so there was no way he was going to get any benefit from this job anymore, except fucking the kid while no one could see or get to them, the doors being powered by electricity entirely. No one could force them open with their bare hands.

Roxas, however, was getting hotter. Unnaturally hotter as he unwillingly smothered Xigbar's fingers in spit and two fingers felt around in the dark and found his entrance, jamming in. He screamed, tears streaming down his face and sweat permeating from his pores, and heat, as he had tried and tried again to do, forced from his mind.

They were both doused in orange light simultaneously as the fiery energy shot from Roxas's brain. Xigbar cried out angrily, cursing. The small spark burned his forehead.

Roxas thrust his hand out in the dark, feeling over the gnarled face before finding the smooth burn. Before the man above him could even process what he was trying to do, the young boy grunted and clenched his jaw as he pulled the wound from him, feeling the burn transfer to his own forehead, then he thought. He thought hard about Axel, nothing but Axel, and the lights and power came back, fixed, and his body began to burn. Xigbar exclaimed, nearly jumping back when he saw the boy had turned transparent, was touching skin with him, but Xigbar wasn't going with him.

_Axel. __**Axel**__. Not Xigbar, I want to see __**Axel**__ again._

He held his breath as he squeezed through the vacuum tube and came out, breathing hard as if he had been submerged in water for hours. He opened his eyes and he was laying on the ground, a fuzzy form standing above him. He blinked until the red hair, the malachite eyes, the "insomnia" under said eyes (along with the diamonds) came into focus.

Axel Fox stooped down to Roxas Hart, pet the boy's sweaty bangs out of his gorgeous, _real_, sapphire eyes, life returning to him in his first, genuine smile in what felt like years.

"Well hey there, Sunshine."

Roxas returned the smile, his eyes glassy, and pushed himself up quickly to pull his one and only love into a locked embrace. He quietly decided that he would explain later.


	17. Regain

"Who are you?"

Naminé had long since recovered from her break down of the revealing of her father's death and was only sitting on the tiled floor, hugging her knees to her flat chest. She stood up, acknowledging the captive's question. "I'm Naminé Rose."

Zexion furrowed his brow, not caring about the biting feeling this action brought to his temples. "How did you know I was here? How did you know what to tell me?"

"I just know, Mr. Harris," she sweetly proclaimed, playing with her hands. The teenager mouthed "Mr. Harris" silently to himself, disliking the unfamiliarity it engendered. "I know almost everything, but only tell the things I can that won't put fate in the wrong direction."

A sort of reverence budded in the pit of Zexion's stomach as he processed what this girl really was. She obviously had something to do with Project 013 -- the "hallucinogen" was in her blood, but it didn't make her a freak like him, or a monster like Axel -- it made her a goddess. He wobbled on his feet once he pushed himself off his table and onto the floor. "You said that scream was Larxene -- your mother."

"I did," the externally frail girl nodded, "That's why the power went out for a moment. When she gets really upset, things like that happen."

"Right..." the older boy bobbed his head, focusing on the metallic door as he tightened his robe, "and why was she upset?"

"_Is_ she upset," the angel giggled, reading the air swiftly afterward, "She...she's upset she can't find me and when she found my dad, he was..." her face ran pale as it had moments ago before the small blackout, when she had explained what Zexion had done to his head and how he had basically shoved Marluxia into making his own illusions for himself.

"...dead?" Zexion asked hopefully, unable to suppress a sadistic grin.

"Yes. Dead." She said it with such finality, the boy shuddered. "We have to get out of here."

The powerful illusionist laughed through his teeth. It hurt. "I've been thinking that ever since I got here."

A haunting smile whispered, florescent across her delicate facial features. "But you can get out this time." A card danced in her hand once she removed it from her breast pocket. "I took this from one of the workers."

Zexion grinned, the coruscating card's light reflecting in his baby blues. He was liking this girl more and more by the moment's passing. He saw a new beginning in that card -- a whole new stretch of his life lying ahead of him.

"We have to tell Paine to tell Demyx to meet us all at the pond out back," she explained gravely, "That's where everyone's heading."

Workers scrambled through the halls, yelling orders, calling out, walkie-talkies garbling. Naminé's escaped, Roxas isn't in his cell, the cameras aren't working. Xemnas was searching Roxas's cell as he hollered insults over his shoulder to Xigbar.

Paine pushed through the crowd, making her way to Demyx's cell. Naminé had whispered to her through an air duct to take him to the pond, and she knew it was incredibly unwise to ignore the girl. She was trustworthy and powerful and she knew what she could do. She had to listen.

"Demyx!" she pushed out of her lungs, hanging in the doorway. She wasn't greeted by her nephew, but a wide-shouldered, tall figure staring down at her. Lexaeus Smith. She looked up at him, clearning her throat and standing up as straight as she could.

"I'd like to see Demyx, Lexaeus."

Those beady, navy eyes shifted everywhere but onto her face as he stammered "I-I was told to keep the subject inside."

"I'm not taking him outside," Paine conversed calmly, crossing her arms, "I'd just like to _see _him."

The bear considered this for a short moment then bobbed his head seriously, stepping to the side. Demyx was sitting quietly on the couch. She rushed to him.

"Aunt Paine?" he questioned, confused before she grasped his shoulders fiercely. His eyes widened.

"Demyx, do you know what's going on?" She whispered hoarsely. Her nephew shook his head hesitantly before she went on. "Roxas is out of his cell and Zexion's escaping. Everyone's meeting at the pond outback."

Light shown blissfully in the boy's teal eyes, his lips curving into a wide, close-mouthed smile. It quickly waned when he looked back at Lexaeus, trying to catch a shred of what they were talking about. "What are we going to do about him?"

Paine glanced over her shoulder at the gentle giant. "He's a real softy. I'll take care of him."

She stood, regarding Lexaeus with a stern, important glare. He wriggled uncomfortably beneath her crimson slits as words escaped her slightly parted lips. "He says he isn't feeling very well. He wants to go outside and get some fresh air.

Lexaeus tilted his head effortlessly over hers, darting his eyes to the aquakinetic. Demyx hurried to hold his stomach and whine pitifully but convincingly. The official looked back at Paine, nodding with a small "Hm," and, "I'll have to escort you both."

The relatives felt their stomachs sink, but kept poker faces.

"I'm helping you guys. I know what you're _really_ doing."

Paine's eyes widened in sync with Demyx's. "You're willing to put your job on the line to help us out?"

He shook his head, simultaneously saying, "I already have enough money. I don't need to be doing this anymore."

Roxas explained to Axel between soft kisses and caresses everything that had happened between him and Xigbar -- from their first meeting and how the man slowly got under Roxas's skin, and to their -- hopefully -- last meeting before he teleported to Axel's room, his lips running like lightning under Axel's from his paranoia that the man might appear any minute, but Axel had the opposite effect with these words, becoming more comfortable by every syllable, sliding a hand up the boy's thigh.

"Are you even _listening?_" Roxas asked, swatting at perverse paws that recoiled and slunk to his behind to "compromise".

"Of course I'm listening," the reborn pyro chuckled, pressing his hot tongue against a living pulse. Roxas moaned. "But I can't leave a half-eaten plate unfinished. Can't you let me eat the rest?" He snuck his finger toward his opening suggestively.

Roxas sighed angrily, pushing away and shuffling through snowy white drawers of equally white garments. The fox remained attached despite the shove, connected to the back of his hips, squeezing and rubbing and _irritating _him to no end. Roxas was blushing; there was no denying that, but his shaking of the head was angry, as well as the tone of his voice. "You just missed having sex with me."

In any other situation, Axel would've said that he did, jokingly of course, but Roxas's tone was serious. It was genuine and slightly laced with a small sob, better yet the anger, and his whole body was quivering. He'd taken the joke a little too far again, huh?

He let go of the hips and said in his truly human voice, "Of course I didn't, Ro. Not _just _that because...well, who would I be kidding if I said I didn't miss having sex with you? But I missed _you_ because...you're just you, kid. I pretty must distrust every damned thing _but _you. You know there's more to us then just sex. We have the red string of fate attached, and that thing doesn't break. Isn't this proof enough?"

The drawer closed and Roxas emerged with white pants and a tank-top in his folded arms, turned around and smiling through tears rolling down his face. "I love you," he laughed, "so much."

Axel smiled down at him bringing him into a close hug. "I love you so much more."

He thread his fingers through golden locks, the two of them standing, breathing soundly in the musical chords of their beautifully quiet -- but understood -- thoughts. After Roxas had calmed down enough, he spoke. "I need to get dressed. We need to get out of here."

"I thought you said you could only teleport yourself?"

"I'm not sure," Roxas continued, hurriedly pulling his pants on, "but I know I have Xigbar's power, and he transported the two of us when he touched my skin. Maybe..."

He looked down at his chest, smoothing the creases out. He grasped tightly at the fabric on his tank-top and concentrated, furrowing his brow and tightening his dry lips. Axel watched with bated breath as the boy's palms began to tingle and there was a crack, and he appeared two feet behind where he originally stood, his pants lying in a heap in front of him. Axel snorted, pushing his knuckles against his lips. "Impressive."

"Shut up!" Roxas snapped, snatching up the pants and shimmying back into them. He bunched the fabric back into his hand, grabbing a handful of pants cloth in the other. This time he appeared two feet to the left, fully clothed. Roxas made a small squeal of delight, thoroughly proud of himself.

"Damn..." Axel shook his head as the shorter one took his hand, "And I was hoping we could wheelbarrow our way out of here."

Blue eyes under an inclined brow looked up at the man as he bundled handfuls of their clothes in his fingers. "What do you mean 'wheelbarrow'?"

A shortened eyebrow cocked above smirking eyes and suddenly Roxas knew, blushing feverishly. Axel belted out a short laugh and whacked his back, nearly toppling him over. "I'm just kidding, Ro! Calm down! Your face is redder than my fucking hair!"

"Hold onto my arm," the boy replied through his teeth nonetheless in mock anger, and Axel obeyed, a grin plastered on his face as they broke into the fabric of reality and they were consumed by nothingness.

Naminé and Zexion stood side-by-side in front of the artificial pond, their hair disheveled and their clothes covered in dust. The taller one was attempting to wipe all the dust off furiously, combing his hair with his fingers and shaking his robe out. He knew he wouldn't like climbing through that air duct. He just knew it. The enclosed space, fucking dust everywhere...but he didn't care when he heard that oh-so familiar voice calling after him in the distance. His hands became rigid and he looked up, seeing three figures charging toward him. The one taking the lead was flailing an arm, calling his nickname over and over again.

"Zexy, Zexy, Zexy, _Zexy!_"

"_Dem--!"_ his crying out of his lover's name was interloped by an attack of nuzzles at the chest, and Zexion smiled. He really smiled for the first time in what he couldn't even fathom. Then he laughed for the first time in the same amount of ridiculous measures of time, finishing the word. "--yx."

"Ew, you're all covered in dust!" the taller boy gave the smaller one's hair a fierce ruffle, watching the dust puff around and wiping the filth off his own cheek. Zexion coughed, sighing.

"I know." He was still smiling. Seeing those eyes again, and so near his face. He couldn't help it.

"I'll clean you up," He held those small shoulders and gave himself some room – two steps back.

The pond laced with tall grass and cattails around the border lay straight in his vision, his eyes fogged over with that milky-white film. Paine, her arms crossed as always, noticed this disturbance and nudged Lexaeus next to her in the stomach. "Weren't they putting drugs in his food?"

"Until recently," Lexaeus whispered back, "I convinced them to stop a week ago because he's totally harmle—"

His words were broken by a large splash of water, and all eyes save for blind ones watched the pond. The center of it pushed down, concave, before it bounced back and created a waterspout, sounding as if hundreds of showerheads and rainstorms were running at once. It snaked around and made its way over Zexion's head, detaching from the larger body of water and forming into a shapeless mass around the teen's limbs before gently evaporating from him, carrying the dust and dirt and every trace of moisture out of his clothes and hair and dumping it all back into the pond.

They all stood, speechless, staring at the water as it struggled to settle and Demyx held his head, swaying on the spot as his eyes came back into focus. Paine eventually smirked, side glancing at the taller man. "Harmless?" Lexaeus's laugh was short-lived, for he jumped when an echoing _crack_ intercepted the climbing peace, swiftly followed by heavy panting.

"Axel and Roxas." Naminé cooed, pointing at the bundle of white, red, and blonde leisurely churning at her feet, all heads spinning to the spot. Grass rustled as feet moved across it at varying speeds, Demyx dropping to his knees to get a closer look. Roxas's fluffy head of blonde lifted up from Axel's chest, his blue eyes squinting and blinking in the sunlight. He squeaked and nearly tripped on his knees when he recognized the mullet in front of him, though slightly wilder due to the time passed. Demyx pulled him into his arms as Axel moaned, sitting up on his haunches and scratching the back of his head.

"Did we make it with all our clothes?"

Roxas was on his feet, making his way to Zexion and holding him tightly to him when he answered, "Yeah. We did."

Axel stood up, dusting himself off and checking the fabrics he wore carefully as Roxas excitedly darted to Naminé, stopping when he realized he'd never met her before. Axel couldn't help but chuckle, the same chuckle echoing smally throughout the group. It was strange but wonderful to be back together, but the reality took a while to soak in. For the first few moments, it was terribly awkward, but eventually the couples found eachother's arms and they were home again.

Then Demyx gasped at Naminé sitting on the bank of the pond, holding her knees to her chest. "Oh! You're covered in dust, too!" He went up to her, patting her shoulders off. The girl didn't react. "I'm sorry! Here – I'll clean you off really quick."

"There's no need."

Demyx backed away. Her voice was so clear, sincere. Something about it was fierce enough to puncture Demyx like a bullet.

"So you had help."

Everyone hunched their shoulders at once at the cold voice woven with lightning and an iciness that rivaled Vexen's skin. Naminé was the only one who spun around at the voice, crying, "Mommy!" and dashing to Larxene's legs, holding onto them tightly. The woman combed her fingers through her daughter's locks, pushing her chin up to see those blind eyes, the only thing left of Marluxia. And they couldn't see.

She drew her gun from her belt and pointed it at Zexion, but Paine pulled her own gun out at the same time, a red, laser dot quivering against the smaller woman's cheek. Larxene looked at her challengingly, picking Naminé up and holding her at the hip with one arm. The light danced between the two similar faces sporadically. "Your hand is shaking, Ms. Paine. Shoot, and you risk killing my daughter."

Paine bit her lip, her grip on the gun shaky still. Axel stepped forward, about to ignite, but Roxas grasped his arm and pulled him back. Zexion couldn't even think about making an illusion happen without his head pounding.

"That's what I thought," the vixen grinned, snapping the gun back onto her belt and pulling out a radio. "Xemnas. I found them -- all of them. They're all at the pond. I need reinforcements. Over."

An unbelieving silence as heads turned to watch the scene and Larxene replaced the radio with her pistol. Then the radio crackled into life against her hip. "Fantastic. Sending them out now. Over."

There was a crack and Roxas disappeared with the loud _crack_. Larxene flinched and shot off her gun as she turned, startled, the bullet embedding into Paine's hand, causing her to gasp and drop her gun and Lexaeus to duck at the sound. Demyx saw the oncoming army of labcoated and armed workers exiting the building beyond. He pointed Axel in that direction and cried, "Zexy, _run_!"


	18. Resist

Axel and Zexion were immediately encircled by a large radius of machine guns and hunting rifles and had no choice but to raise their hands in the air as one helmeted officer yelled, "So much as a spark, Fox, and you'll be blown to bits!" The pyro snorted with a haughty glare, feeling the heat rise within him steadily nonetheless, but he knew they'd feel it if he got hot enough to create fire, so he struggled to stay under the limit. Zexion held his head, hardly able to think.

Larxene stood across from Demyx, her daughter standing a foot beside her, holding her fists to her mouth. The stream between their eyes was locked and unblinking -- deadly. One or the other was going to be put out to finalize their battle.

"Larxene!" an officer dressed in padded black asked, "Do you want us to --?"

"No." The gently swarming officials set back a little at the force of the piercing syllable. "This will start everything. What I do here will decide whether or not they'll all be able to live -- whether or not they'll have the starting move or the upper hand. I want this to be _my _choice."

An understanding erupted in their eyes as they stepped back, expecting a massive outbreak of war between the two. They raised eyebrows, breaths shallow and quiet when Larxene raised up her hands, detaching her gun and radio from her belt with two fingers and throwing them away from her in the grass.

"Mommy!" Naminé's strangled sob called as she turned her head toward the noise.

"Step away, Nami." Larxene whispered, not breaking the gaze, "but stay close." The girl obeyed.

Demyx was cautious as he hovered his hand to his right, toward the pond. He would shoot a stream, a heavy-pressured stream right into Larxene's face. It would knock her down, catch her off guard, and then he'd pull all the liquid out of her. A shiver came down his spine. No, not that again. He instead let the water snake around his arm freely, balls of liquid breaking off from the surface, floating and rotating about him. Larxene was a stone statue.

"Ma'am, what are you--!?"

"_Quiet!_"

The vixen's tone was callous and snarling, but tears were running freely down her face. _Come on, water boy. Give us your best shot. Knock this one out of the park and run on home._

_Home_.

But then there was the girl. Demyx didn't want to hit her -- she was innocent. But she was also with Larxene. His body quaked within the swirling water, his eyes completely blank as it rushed past his ears. He felt as if he was one with the sea -- Poseidon himself.

"She controls electricity..." Zexion breathed. An official jabbed him with a "hey", but they didn't hear Axel's response.

"There's nothing electric around here. It's suicide."

"_No_," Zexion indicated Naminé with a shaking finger, then cried, "Demyx, _stop!_"

But the young man couldn't hear him. He was immersed in his own world, getting ready to torrent the water forth onto his victim as Larxene stood there, eyes wide, expecting the end.

Three...two...one..._and_..._**strike!**_

"_**Naminé!**_"

The girl turned her head just in time to catch her mother's clawed hand upon her face. She screamed. Demyx screamed. The entire existence of _all_ seemed to scream with every ounce of matter possible as plasma flashed up Larxene's arm, lavender and periwinkle and blinding white, out her other arm stretched out toward the once advancing water. Sparks flew as she hunched her back, her head turned away from the catastrophe, her eyes clenched closed, her child screaming in her ear as her mind jumbled and blended, her face aging and crisping. Demyx was suspended in the air, chest up, arms writhing as the electricity shook and burned him, and his scream awoke and slayed something in Zexion simultaneously as the vibrating image flashed in his eyes.

The electricity burned out, the water fell to the grass, and two bodies fell dead to the ground, burnt black. Unmoving.

The one who breathed first in the devastating, ringing quiet was Zexion, the most suffocating breaths he'd ever felt constrict his lungs. He began to tremble and Axel felt the air hum with energy; tense, sad, _crazed _energy.

_(my name's demyx, by the way. but axel probably already told you that...)_

"Zex..." Axel choked, trying to catch a glimpse of the teen's face, but it was hidden in a sprawled jungle of hair, his cheeks behind his hunched shoulders. His fists were clenched.

(_do you like him? his name's arpeggio. he's a sitar, but i'm sure you already knew that since you're super smart and all...)_

A man in the circle around them belted out a holler, dropped his gun, and fell to his knees. Axel watched in shocked awe as several more followed after that, some seizing in the grass. He stole this opportunity to shove through the crowd to safety, outside of the circle. His ears had started to ring.

(_have you ever done this before? well, i haven't...and this time it won't be bad like it was with him, okay? i hope...)_

The waves of power generated by Zexion were almost visible in the air, pulsing from him, the epicenter, and pushing full circles of men backward. What they were seeing, Paine, Lexaeus and Axel were glad they didn't as another defined, bloodcurdling yelp sliced through to the sky. Larxene had already fled the scene.

_(so the government's after us now? ugh. we have the worst luck, huh?)_

But Zexion Harris wasn't going for her. He was out get...

Who?

_Everyone kill them __**ALL!!!**_

The same vice that usually gripped and twisted his head was back, but this time it was as if said vice had bathed in flames beforehand. The searing, hot metal clenched around his temples as he sang out his outcry, high above the rest, his arms thrown out at his sides. The air shook with the intensity of a tornado -- a storm of fragmented affections. Men depreciated, asphyxiating themselves and lacerating their throats with their fingernails to try and escape the world of hurt.

(_i'm sorry. it's just...i'm just worried.)_

_(what are you worried about?)_

Axel watched in sick fascination as he slowly began to realize that the scream was a name.

_Demyx's name._

And then it diminished as soon as it developed. Every man had fallen either to their knees, stomach, or back. Only a few were breathing, heavily. Zexion followed suit and collapsed into the grass like a rag doll, and the three still standing barreled toward him. Axel kneeled to him and lifted the boy's head up, cradling it carefully in his lap. He was still breathing, wheezing -- blood smeared over his face from his nostrils, his mouth, and his eyes -- they were dyed red.

_(demyx.)_

Cough. "I...I loved him."

Axel bit his lip, trying to hold his tears back. It wasn't helping. "I know."

"Axel..." he hissed through the sting, "_Please_..." He broke into a cloud of blood through a chain of hacks, spraying Axel's white shirt with crimson dots. The redhead's hands were shaking for what felt like an eternity of his friend's suffering.

Until...

(_let me go home.)_

he was gone.

No one blinked, no one breathed. Just thought, mourning in an accepted silence that howled louder than any other quiet. Axel eventually got the courage to stand up, shaking off the sorrow of his two lost friends, trying to push it away.

"You two," he spoke without turning around, "Bury the bodies. All of them."

Paine and Lexaeus looked at each other, asking through their eyes if the other could even bear it. Then Paine asked in a defeated voice, "What are you going to do?"

The fox shook his fiery mane and started toward the shed at the far side of the clearing. "Find Roxas."

He'd teleported so fast, he didn't get a chance to take his clothes with him. Great. He crossed his arms in the cold dark. He hadn't the foggiest where he was or what had drawn him there, but he could see light shining through dusty cracks as his eyes adjusted, and the scent of gasoline and metal -- tools. Lawnmowers and shovels and bags of fertilizer. He had to be in a large tool shed, or a barn made up to be filled with tools instead of animals.

He felt around for walls with his right hand, keeping his left arm to his chest. Rakes rattled and shelves creaked as his fingers brushed against them.

Something churned somewhere across from him and Roxas jumped, spinning around. He wasn't the only one in the barn. He wasn't alone. His heart hammered as the floorboards above his head scraped and moaned, like a boat lost at sea, slowly tipping over.

The boy ran, far younger and less directed then ever. His hands stopped him before he hit the wall, and he looked up toward the crepitating noise and in a dull flash, he was bludgeoned on the head. He cried out weakly before he dropped on his stomach gracelessly, completely unconscious.

Boots dropped to the dirt bottom of the barn and Xigbar Crutch tossed his shovel to the side, observing the bare bottom on the ground in front of him. The ass he so coveted. He winked his nocturnal eye and smirked, stepping toward it, like a cowboy preparing for a duel. He stooped and fussed with his own zipper.

"Can't leave a job unfinished, kid." He spread him open with his thumbs and jammed himself inside. Despite his state of sleep, Roxas's voice broke the air.

Axel gasped for air that he didn't receive under the tan man's grasp, gritting his teeth as the back of his head made contact with a thick oak.

"Where's the boy?" Xemnas cooly asked, his orange eyes turning a fiery red. Axel leered, the temperature rising, but the bodyguard next to the superior pointed his rifle an inch from the Fox's cheek. He growled and Xemnas twisted his grip so he couldn't anymore. "I know you know, Fox. You always know."

"I don't know." Axel struggled to say, pulling at the restraining fingers, "Teleported. Don't know where."

_"__**Axel!**__"_

Birds took flight at the call of the name and dread rose in Axel's chest -- the cry was akin to Zexion's dying plea. Xemnas let go of the pyro's lithe neck, enamored by the barn it came from, and he immediately tore toward it. Axel didn't miss a beat in catching up to him. The bodyguard stood, confused and forgotten, in their dust.

The two bodies rammed into the wooden doors, which Xigbar was smart enough to padlock. They hammered and beat against them until wood cracked and splintered and fell in a cloud of dust. Through the debris, a pistol was discovered attached to a gnarled hand, the weapon accurately pointing at Axel's forehead. Xigbar was crouched next to a heaving Roxas, beaten with blood and semen leaking out of his orifice. Axel's eyes flashed and the temperature rose significantly.

"I suggest you leave, '_Superior'_." Xigbar grinned at his prey as he stood, keeping the gun level. "I don't want anyone _else_ to get hurt. This won't end clean."

Xemnas believed him, wiping the sweat off his neck as he darted away from the semblance of torridity.

A grin as yellow and devious as his eye. "So you're the Fox this one was always talking about."

"I'll also be the last thing you _think_ about." Axel addressed him without blinking. Xigbar chuckled.

"Hoo, tongue of glass, eh? I wondered where the kid got it. He certainly _is _your work of art."

Even Axel was starting to sweat, but he remained as still as stone, his glare not budging. Roxas twitched and wrenched his head up, face strewn with dirt and salty tears. His lips parted just enough for him to weakly mutter, "_Ax...el.._."

The pyrexia began to normalize and Xigbar gave a sigh of relief, fanning himself with his free hand dramatically. "Try your fireworks around me and you risk barbecue-ing 'your only sunshine', Fox."

Xigbar placed a muddy boot on the lower back of the boy, being deliciously awarded with a quivering squeak. Axel's stomach did somersaults. This was _torture. _Roxas was there -- _right there, _being played with and prodded, writhing on the ground weakly and all he could do was _watch._ Those sapphires watched him back, strewn with red and water, and speaking a million "_I love you_"s.

"Look at me, Roxas." Xigbar muttered, sensing the channel of affection between the two. The boy ignored him, a tear slowly trailing down his cheek. His lips moved rapidly, mouthing, "_I'm not letting you go..._" He coughed when the boot pummeled him between the shoulder blades, his nose tasting the dirt. "Look at _me_."

The kitten's entire body shook, growing more pallid. He and Axel both felt as if they would vomit. Roxas struggled to lift his head up to watch Axel's eyes still, still to plead, still to cry.

"I said _look at me!_" The gun swung from the redhead to the blond in a sweeping motion out of Xigbar's frustration and the Fox took this opportunity to pounce, sprinting forward, but --

_BANG._

The crack echoed through the barn, through the earth, through the unseen sky. All noise was replaced with a dull, eternal ring, and everything was in slow-motion as the body fell to the ground, backward, puffing up dust and dirt. A stream of blood danced from above his eye.

Axel wasn't fast enough.

Roxas knew he cried out, but couldn't hear it through the sounding ring. He held his mouth, feeling sick as his eyes stared fleetingly for a sign of life -- _hope_ -- and he saw Axel's chest rise once or twice, shakily. Before he could quietly celebrate, he gagged when Xigbar's hand clutched around his neck, forcing him on his feet, face-to-gun with the end of his pistol, the rebel's face on the other end -- putrid, yellow eye flashing next to his eye-patch, contorted into a face of anger. His voice was breathless.

"...I told you to look at me."


	19. Relive

A/N - Ehhh...Sorry if this chapter seems a little rushed. It wasn't really, I swear. I just suck. Really bad. At writing climatic endings. I want to put so much detail in, but I can't really do that without assaulting the reader with a big ol', fat page of DESCRIPTION DESCRIPTION OHLAWD without still being melancholy and sad and...nnnngh. One more chapter after this, and it's not even long. It's like...an epilogue, pretty much. SO YEAH. HOORAY FOR SHITTY ENDINGS.

Everything as still in slow motion. He couldn't breathe. The only thing the boy could hear was his heartbeat, which he knew was rapid, but it pounded like the steady beat of a drum in his chest.

_bu-bump...bu-bump...bu-bump..._

Xigbar held his neck with one hand, pointing his gun at Roxas's nose with the other. _Death...I finally get to see the little boy die._ His teeth were gritted into a maniacal visage, and the temperature went up in a trice as he pulled the trigger, but the bang was halted. Flames swirled to life in front of dazzling gems of azure, and Roxas fell in a heap to the floor as Xigbar screamed, shaking his burning hand in terror. Time sped back up, but still Roxas just heard his heartbeat and the crackling fire.

_bu-bump, bu-bump, bu-bump, bu-bump --_

The pistol got so hot, it melted into the man's skin, melding with his hand. There was a squealing noise that quickly raised in volume and pitch, until Xigbar's face caught on fire and his strangled screams silenced themselves, his arms flailing and writhing before he fell to the ground, crackling beside Roxas.

"The bullet..." Axel croaked, "It didn't reach you...did it?"

Roxas answered the pyro's question by picking his trembling head up, unscathed. He scurried over to the man, said man smiling and laughing quietly, the laugh quickly transitioning into a bloody cough. He breathed as steadily as he could, squinting up at his lover, his only, his _kid_. "I was saving all that control I had in me...just for him."

"I love you," Roxas spoke, involuntarily. He didn't even notice the tears until they dripped onto Axel's blood-stained shirt, small flecks bouncing to his lips and cheeks. "I love you, Axel, I love you. I'll never stop loving you. Please don't leave me. I can't --"

"You _can_..." a rough hand met Roxas's cheek. He held onto it.

_bu-bump...bu-bump...bu-bump..._

"Roxas...Demyx and Zexion are dead."

A hand grasped Roxas's insides and twisted them.

"I won't be here anymore soon..."

"P-please..." Roxas sniffed, bowing his head, "Don't say that."

"I was shot in the _face_, Babe. There's no hope left for me. I--"

"Not for me either..."

"_Roxas._"

Glassy blue and clouding green met.

_bu-...bump...bu-...bump...bu-...bump..._

"You're...the only one left..." Axel dwindled into coughs, sprinkling Roxas's neck and chest with beads of red. "You have to keep going. For us -- the _world_. The world needs to know all this shit that happened so it will never happen again. Promise us, Roxas..."

Blink. Drip. Sniff. Trembling...

"_Promise me, Roxas..." _His voice cracked.

_bu-...bump...bu...b-..._

The rhythm died. Axel's hand had dropped. The flames still crackled. Breaths quaking, Roxas grabbed the dropped hand with both of his, pulling it to his lips in a half kiss.

_Cold. His hands are always warm..._

He lay on his still chest, holding onto the hand, waiting for the warmth, the heat, the beat, the breath...the _life_. The voice he'd never hear again in its calming sultriness, his touch, his...warmth...it...it never came.

He took a finger and thumb, gently closing his loved one's eyelids, kissing him on the forehead.

"..._I promise."_

Dawn often comes before the darkness, just as darkness before the dawn.

There's always a moment between the two -- a transition that leads to something greater. The birds were silenced, shaking in their feathers, anticipating the future. The few living officials, backed up by a squad of lab-coated scientists holding their weapons of destruction, (there were about fifteen people in all) stood outside the barn in a curve, still as the silence about them, awaiting the emergence of whatever lay within. Paine and Lexaeus didn't have shovels to bury the bodies with, so they compromised by throwing the charred and crippled bodies into the lake with stones in their clothes. Paine couldn't help but sob when it was over.

Then a gun went off, or so everyone thought. The noise was metallic, explosive. The gun had literally exploded in the man's hands, showering scalding shrapnel which _tinked_ off helmets. As the former holder of the bomb swatted at the air, his body immersed in flames, every man dropped his gun almost simultaneously as the barn doors slammed open, nearly falling off the hinges.

Roxas stood, so very small in the frame of the barn's mouth, emerging through the scattering dust, his head bowed, his eyes blind -- his body clothed in filth -- dirt and blood. For every, slow step he took, an explosion occurred or a body flew, women shrieking as men around had their heads erupting in gray matter, bodies twisting and mangling, and then the boy's mind found the pond, and he created icicles in the air, firing them like darts with only a press of barefoot to grass.

(_it's your fault. it's all your fault.)_

A heavy oak tumbled over from the force of a mental blow, and two soldiers grabbed nearby guns and aimed over the log, _ratatatatat_ing their bullets at the ever-approaching menace, the creator of the swift holocaust that was quickly turning the sky orange. They gasped when they realized the boy had disappeared. Panicked, they dropped their guns and scurried in whatever direction they deemed safe, only to be met face-to-face with two blue flames shrouded in billowing blonde.

He grinned before ripping their heads off in unison, satisfied with a squelching, tearing sound. He tasted the blood as he closed his lips back over his teeth.

_(i like it.)_

Elena. Elena was the one who did the most experimentation on Axel, telling him to blow up cinderblocks, to try to _control_ it, and she was never _nice _about it.

_(where is she?)_

She held her arms to her chest, tight, breathing in sharp, painful breaths, he back against a tree. _Oh God._ A blade of ice had nicked her in the stomach earlier, aiming for a fleeing man next to her. It stung, right on her side. She shook her head vehemently. _Please, no. I don't want to go yet. I don't deserve this._

"I disagree."

She gasped, looking to her right. Roxas stood, his arms folded behind his back, smiling. From her shoes up to her hair, flames ate her up and she screeched, curling and twitching until she was almost an unidentifiable pile of shriveled ash.

The laugh began in his throat, then traveled up, higher, _higher_, until he was barking at the sky, eyes wild.

_Who's next? Who dares to be my next victim? _

Larxene. She killed Demyx, then Zexion was hit down like a domino because of that. She deserved it, almost the most, but --

"Having fun, Hart?"

The adrenaline took hold of him, and he felt as if his limbs were made of lead as his mirth died down. There, seemingly towering above him, was a man dressed absurdly against the immolation surrounding him -- in a very clean tux against his tan skin, his silver hair, his orange, scrutinizing eyes. The boy didn't want to kill him -- not yet -- but he couldn't place _why_. It was as if he had been living a dream, and God himself had stepped in to say it was time to wake up. He showed him his palm, upside-down.

"Come," his deep voice beckoned, "I'll show you to my office."

There was a final holler in the distance before the only sound left was the burning wood and grass, hissing in the wind.

_It'd be nice...to leave this dream..._

He took the hand and was pulled forward, deep into the secrets of the world, like a wormhole, like a vacuum, like the hallucinating part of the drug he took six years ago finally kicked in before his feet clapped on the wooden ground, and he was in an office. God was naked as well this time, but it didn't faze Roxas. Nudity didn't matter when you were dead.

_(when your love's dead.)_

He let go, his back turned to him, his skin baked a cinnamon brown, ethnic, maybe indian, but somehow quite gorgeous. He folded his arms behind his back. Roxas blinked several times, trying to ebb away the dizziness of the slow, fast world around him, how everything went so rapidly, how death was so frivolous, how screams were like water to his parched throat. He took a seat on the cold, hardwood floor, awaiting his castigation.

"Do you know..." the bass began, looking slightly over his shoulder at him, "...why you all were brought here?"

Roxas kept watching, no response. He didn't shake his head or nod. His fingers twitched slightly on the ground in front of him. He continued nonetheless.

"We set up agents around your home to watch you all. That was part of the contract. After you were injected with the drug inappropriately deemed 'hallucinogen', the agents were sent to watch your progress, and see if you would ever develop any more powers...

"Webb said he had the suspicion you had the ability to copy other's powers whenever you healed them. This intrigued me. He also told me that once you hit puberty, your powers should boom, far greater than they were when you were first exposed to the substance. I can see now, he was absolutely correct.

"When I sent the agents to capture you four, it was because I thought Fox was attempting to hide you away from us, so we were rash and took up the opportunity to chase you all down. Webb asked me why I wanted you so badly. I told him your power might be able to restore Naminé's vision..."

The boy cocked his head, furrowing his brow. "Why--?"

"It was a lie." Xemnas intercepted, "I told him I wanted to repay Larxene for my wrong-doing to her child. As Naminé was delivered, I held her, and touched her face, right over her eyes."

(_**my eyes! he's pulling my eyes out! AXEL, i can't see! I CAN'T SEE!!)**_

_**"**_You..." whispered Roxas unbelievably, "You gouged her eyes--?"

"I didn't," Xemnas corrected, spinning around, holding his hand close to his face. "I, too, was injected with the devilish substance. My power is subtle, but when I touch an eye, even if it's covered by an eyelid, it goes blind.

Roxas smiled. What a useless power.

"I wanted you, _all _of you, because I wanted my own power. I was jealous of everyone else. I wanted to find a way to control fire, water, illusions...I wanted to be _immortal_. I _want _to be immortal. I want all the power it takes to make me live forever, above all the rest."

Roxas's eyes widened in fear as the man's lips parted slightly and he laughed. A cold, heartless laugh that even unnerved the boy, who was on the brink of his sanity.

"But do you know what I wanted most of all?" The voice shook with hysteria. Roxas shook his head before there was a loud crack and he was gone, warm, chest skin touched back skin, and Roxas's wrists were grasped and pinned to the ground.

"_You._"

An almost magnetic force formed between the two, like a positive and negative magnet, and Xemnas was flung into the air, against the wall, and Roxas was holding his neck to it in a flash, melting his skin beneath his palm. His eyes weren't blue anymore. They were boiling red. "_Try me._"

Without lifting a finger, Roxas's mind ripped Xemnas's right leg from his hip, _slowly._ It squelched and churned, showering the boy in a new coat of red.

Then the next leg.

Then the arm, clean off the shoulder.

Then the other arm.

"You wanted me, _right_!?" Roxas broke his voice through the screaming and crunching, spitting and gritting his teeth against the whimperings of the "Superior", "Aren't you _satisfied_!? Have enough of '_me'_ yet!?"

There was no fire. Instead, Xemnas's skin began to peel and flake off, starting from the tip of his penis, slowly crawling up to his face. The skin turned black, fleetingly sprinkling the ground in ashes.

Roxas dropped him, smoldering mess, into the puddle of his own, punishable blood.

He sat down, watching the being. He still screamed and cried, whimpering, coughing. He still had his hair, he still had his eyes, he--

A hand struck at his face, thwarting him straight into the eyeball and Roxas exclaimed in surprise before the hand fell as quickly as it rose -- limp. The scent of smoke filled his senses. He uncovered the eye and he couldn't see anything out of it. _Goodbye, depth perception_ he thought mockingly to himself.

It was his right eye. Fleetingly, he remembered the one yellow eye in the dark and didn't think it was so funny anymore.

He fell into darkness, appearing in front of The Org building, in front of the road.

"_Roxas._"

He spun his head around to see a a woman, holding her hand, dragging her leg toward him. _Paine_. He'd never seen her look so weak, so hurt. Her eyes were pleading for him to come and help her, and there was a man, a large man behind her, holding his chest, out of breath.

_You did that to them, Roxas._

A pick up truck approached him on the road, and he darted toward it, feeling the tears in the rushing wind.

He managed to scramble into the back, unnoticed. For a while, he hoped.

Roxas Hart...was no more. Roxas had died when Axel died. Roxas had died when he saw the condition of the innocent he had injured. He was a different person -- someone new. He knew this as he looked at his hands, indistinguishable through the dirt and ash and blood. Not a trace of white could be found in them.

All that had passed must have been a dream, but it wasn't. He had the scars -- mental, emotional, and physical -- to prove it.

Larxene. She was the only one left. She smelled the remains of Xemnas smoldering from the bathroom she was hiding in and went to investigate.

The pile was still human. Somehow. Eyes wide open and yellowed, mouth gaping and charred. His hair was gone by now. Instead of lurching or gagging, she found this image quite amusing and smirked.

She took the plaque lying on Xemnas's desk bearing his name and gently placed it face down, circling around the desk carefully, remembering to swing her hips a little extra. She sat down in the chair, folding her arms behind her head, stretching out her buttoned shirt over her breasts.

"So you thought on that promotion, huh, Mansex?" she called over to the pile of dust as she planted crossed heels on the desk's edge. The rug at the center of the room had caught fire. She didn't flinch. "Thanks for the upgrade. _Appreciate _it!"

Moments went by as the room was surrounded by heat and flames. She merely smiled, shaking her head, laughing quietly to herself.

"So, this was the 'present' my little girl was talking about." A large piece of wood dropped from the ceiling, sending sparks as it fell. "Oh, it's good to be Queen."


	20. Epilogue

_Three years have passed since then. I saw the report of The Org building burning down on the news a couple days later. No survivors. Not even Paine or Lexaeus._

_I still believe that I lived a dream while lost in my lust for carnage. That wasn't me. I will never believe it was me. I tumbled out of the truck as soon as I was found out, stumbling, weak and weary, to whatever home I would find first._

_Out of whatever god's grace, I stumbled onto the porch of Sora and Riku._

_At first, they were scared. They didn't know what to do with a figure caked in muck such as I was, and the stench? It was unbearable. Nonetheless, Riku carried my weak form to the bathroom, turning the shower on for me after he sat me on the toilet. A heavy sigh of relief released from my chest that glowed inside me as I happily clambered inside._

_I wear an eye patch now, which I greatly dislike, but I've learned to live with it. It's a staple to me. It reminds me of the past and how terrible it was, but I survived. It reminds me how lucky I am to have -_

"_Ven!" _Riku calls from downstairs, and the one known as Ventus (he can't bear to be called Roxas anymore) jumps, dropping his pen in mid-write. "Miss Gainsborough's here for your lesson today!"

The woman's kind voice murmurs something along the lines of, "Please, just call me Aerith." Ven whispers, "Time to go," to his incapacitated pen before scooting back and heading down the stairs.

Aerith is a soft woman. She's wearing a salmon-pink dress today that modestly whispers around her ankles, and her curly hair is down for a change. She extends a hand to the eye-patched boy, which he takes. "Good to see you again, Ventus."

"My pleasure." The boy smiles, and they sit at the kitchen table to discuss school matters as Riku escapes into the bedroom with Sora.

"Aerith..." the boy asks mid-lesson, twiddling with his pencil to make it look rubber, "How do you get a book published?"

The woman blinks, flipping a few pages in her lesson plan as if to look for the answer. "I...know an editor. Why?"

"I want to get something published."

"Something you wrote?"

"Mhm."

She puts the end of her pen to her lips in thought before speaking. "Your writing is exceptionally good, especially considering -" she clears her throat, "Well, when whatever you have is finished, just let me know and I can have my editor friend look over it, and I'm sure he knows some reliable publishers."

Ven grins. "That's great."

The blonde slaps his pen down and stretches. Done. All he needed was that one, last stretch of month - of writer's cramp and the enlargement of the callous on his middle finger and he is done. He straightens the papers laced with ink and hands them over to Aerith the next day, who, in turn, gives them to her friend, Vincent Valentine.

A week later, the phone rings, and Sora says it's for him.

"Roxas Hart?" the voice asks, incredibly crackled with what Ven guesses is fatigue. He flinches at the name.

"Yes. That's me."

"I've read your manuscript and would like to schedule a conference with you at my home about the edits I've made. Can you come over, say...this Saturday?"

There's a small pause before Ven nods, remembering he can't be seen. "Of course."

"Great. Aerith can give you my address tomorrow."

"Thank you."

"Thank _you_."

Mr. Valentine's house is large and white, cold the way rich people's houses always are and smelling of Pine-Sol. It reminds him slightly of a certain Brit's home, that he once visited long ago, but far cleaner and more modern. Ven rubs his arms as the door closes behind him and Vincent beckons politely, "Have a seat."

He does so on the softest, biggest, most comfortable chair he'd ever snuggled up in, and the dark, but very handsome man sits across from him. His hair is straight and black as night, stopping right past his shoulders. His eyes are a shocking red and he's dressed in a long-sleeved, white, button-up shirt. He crosses his legs, indicating the manuscript dotted in red stacked on the coffee table between them.

"_Wow_."

Ven can't tell if the remark was sarcastic or not. "You don't believe it's true, do you?"

"I believe every word of it." Vincent annunciates, looking up at the stairwell. "_Xion!"_

Small feet clamor down the stairs and a young girl half the age of Ventus meets them, dressed in a sun dress reminiscent of a maid's outfit. Her hair is also black, but very simple and short, and her face...where has he -" "Yes, Daddy?"

"This is my daughter, Xion." Vincent explains, pulling the young girl onto his lap. Her eyes are a dull blue, but her face..._God, _her face, the the high cheek bones, the small mouth, the almond-shaped eyes. She's just like -

"Naminé?"

Vincent smiles weakly as Xion cocks her head and asks, "What's going on?"

"Nothing, sweetie. You can go up to your room now."

Xion, slightly confused, clambers back up the steps. They watch each other as the footfalls recede.

"Larxene Rose was the mother. It was a one-night stand, and yes, she was already married to Marluxia. She had just had Naminé. People get drunk, Roxas, you have to understand."

Ven nods, attempting to wipe the look of disgust off his face. "Y-yeah. I understand."

"She got pregnant and didn't want Marluxia to find out, so she asked if I knew anyone who'd be willing to carry her. It's...a very expensive, top-secret process that the government has kept quiet for several of years where the fertilized egg in transferred from one uterus to the other. My co-worker, Tifa, agreed to it and carried Xion from then on so she was kept secret. I wouldn't allow any word of her leaking out. It the Org ever knew about Xion, they'd lock her up and throw away the key so they could experiment on her."

Ven nods, looking down, remembering. Vincent notices and quickly picks up again.

"I know you're not lying because of _Xion_. She does things...that I just can't explain. Closes the door without touching it, picks up toys by looking at them. They're little things, yes, but..." he swallows, changing the subject quickly, "I took a red pen through your manuscript, editing some grammar and spelling errors. Those were the only problems. Since it's a memoir, you don't have to really look over my corrections, unless you want to."

"I trust you." Ven whispers, "Will you...publish it? Is it good enough?"

"It's _more _than good enough." the man leans forward to emphasize his truth, "The world needs to know what the government is up to half the time. Sure, some people won't believe, but your writing is so eternal, so breathless, so _human_...It's hard to deny that it's true."

"So you'll do it?"

"I'll get you the best publisher I can find."

Ven laughs, a smile stretching wide across his face. He stands up to thank Vincent, shaking his hand and still smiling out the door, where the sun is setting, washing the sky a deep red. He looks up at it as he walks down the sidewalk, stopping, his mouth slightly open.

_"Hey, Roxas. Bet you don't know why the sun sets red."_

_Roxas scoffed and looked up at the sky with him. He really didn't know._

_"You see, light is made up of lots of colors, and out of all those colors, red is the one that travels the farthest."_

_"Like I asked! Know-it-all."_

The laughter from those years ago rings in his ears as he watches the sun peek out behind a ruby cloud. He smiles and has the urge to wave, but decides to just look.

"Show off," he speaks to the sky, "And see? I told you I'd promise."


End file.
